I'm Matt, a Radar Technician
by The Cowgirl Bookworm
Summary: Spoilers for TFA. Kylo Ren has been reduced to Matt and must deal with his co-workers and the annoying new girl who seems to pop up where ever he goes. Rey just wants to complete her mission, but feels she has to help out the scrawny little blond guy she sees all the time.
1. Chapter 1

Rey couldn't quite believe that she had her first undercover mission, one that would involve passing as a repair tech on the _Finalizer_. At first she'd protested, telling Luke that she didn't want to set foot on that ship ever again and she'd be much more comfortable learning some more about being a Jedi. He merely stood firm, quiet as a rock. Finally her protests had run out, and he spoke. "Rey, you are talented in the Force, but you still lack control. You need to be able to move seamlessly in and out of the Force, to be able to cloak yourself in it so that another User cannot tell you are there. I've taught you what I know, but you need to prove it. You've been shown how to fly a TIE fighter, you will have an escape route available. Your mission is not only to see how long you can last hiding from Ren, but to learn any plans the First Order has or any weaknesses they are showing."

Han had agreed in his usual gruff way. "Can't really tell you've become a good pilot until you run your first blockade." Rey was glad to have him there. She'd been worried back on Starkiller Base, when he had walked out to confront Kylo Ren. But just as it looked like Ren was going to run him through, Chewie had managed a shot that even Rey couldn't believe. The ride back to the Resistance Base had consisted of Chewie, well, chewing Han out for putting himself out in the open like that. Han had fired back that he was trying to save his son. Rey's Wookie wasn't very good, but she could catch the gist of the next remark.

If Chewie didn't bring Han's rotten carcass home, Leia would have him turned into a rug.

They were still a tad bitter toward each other, but their snapping had grown less by the time they dropped her off where the First Order shuttle would pick her up. Rey wasn't quite impressed with the shuttle, one of the boxy ones she'd seen them use to transport Stormtroopers. But she took a deep breath, brushed her Twi'lek tailed hair back over her shoulders, and walked forward with the rest of the new crew.

* * *

Kylo Ren had quickly decided he was having the worst day, week, month, _year_ , ever. He'd done his best, lured Solo out from cover, but there had been something in him that almost broke when he had went to activate his lightsaber. That split second had earned him a blaster bolt that still ached a little. But any ache was better than this. This stupid blond wig, those stupid glasses, the stupid orange vest and the stupid jumpsuit.

Anything was better than being Matt the Radar Technician.

To say Snoke was angry was an understatement. Kylo would have accepted any corporal punishment, but this form of humiliation went to far. But here he was, listening to Lieutenant Colonel Zach and Stormtrooper Tim argue over some inane thing. He wanted his position back, his old quarters and not that closet he'd been shoved in. He almost Force threw Zach when the officer reached over and pushed his shoulder. "Look Matt, new meat."

Sure enough, a group of new recruits was fumbling its way through the break room. Occasionally a bolder one would break off and head for a table, and one was headed straight for them. Kylo fixed his gaze down on his watery something, some white thing that tasted grainy. Rice? He wasn't sure.

"Hi, I'm Rana. I'm a new general repair tech, you mind if I sit here?" Her voice, while not bright and bubbly, was still warm enough. Zach and Tim shook their heads and introduced themselves, smiling and shaking hands. Kylo kept his eyes down. It was definitely rice, and overcooked at that. Maybe if he Force choked the cook he could get officer's meals. They always ate better. The girl spoke again. "And who are you?"

He looked up, she had brown eyes, brown hair, unremarkable and vaguely unsettling at the same time. "I'm Matt, a radar technician." He shifted his hand to the brass badge on his vest.

 _Matt  
_ _Radar Technician_

"Well, I have a feeling we'll probably seeing a lot of each other Matt."

He made some noise, a grunt or something and got up to throw his tray into the wash pile, slamming it down. As he walked out he heard the girl again. "What's his problem?"

"Dude, Matt straight up sucks."


	2. Chapter 2

Her first full day and she'd already been pinged three times before breakfast. She'd seen another tech as she was walking and he informed her that this was considered slow. "Used to be we'd get major repair calls almost every morning, destroyed monitors, wrecked furniture. That Kylo Ren may be high up in the First Order, but he threw a tantrum every time something didn't go right."

Rey slid her screwdriver underneath a panel to lift it. "Really?"

"Yeah, haven't heard much lately." The other tech said, looking down at his data pad. "Sorry, got to go. Trooper blasted a control panel on six." Rey waved, focused on getting at whatever wiring was loose. All she had to do was tighten it up and the panel whirred back to life. Great, maybe she could actually get some breakfast now. It would probably be as bland and tasteless as whatever they had served for lunch yesterday, but the Resistance didn't eat much better. Breakfast in general would be good, if she could actually find where that break room was. Nobody told her that Star Destroyers didn't come with maps on the walls. She moved down a hallway, catching somebody's voice as they blew up.

"Does that look like the calcinator? What's wrong with you? Why is it so hard for you to understand?" A supervisor was standing above Matt who was fishing around in a mess of wires.

Matt snapped back. "I don't know, but could you please stop yelling at me? You're starting to stress me out." Rey could almost feel the anger coming off him. Actually, she could feel it, like a angry red wave roiling through the Force. Damn, Matt must be really pissed if it was transmitting through the Force.

"Okay, now can we rewire it please? So I can go have my muffin? I haven't had my muffin yet, Matt." The supervisor may have backed off a little, but she was still acting hostile. Matt looked like he wanted to punch something, more than likely he would break his hand doing that, so Rey quickly inserted herself into the conversation.

"I'll show him. Go get your muffin, we'll be fine." She smiled as the supervisor turned away, then knelt down beside Matt. "Can't find the calcinator?"

Matt turned a shade of red that she'd only seen in sunsets on Jakku. "I mainly worked on smaller systems."

Rey pulled out a yellow tube, wires sticking out of both ends where it connected to the main line. "Hand me some wire and we can get this started."

"Wire?"

Rolling her eyes, she reached over and plucked a roll of wire from his vest.

* * *

She'd touched him. Just reached right over and pulled some wire from his vest. It was more contact than he'd had with most people for, well, a very long time. He watched as she deftly unscrewed the tube and pulled apart the two halves, revealing a collection of wires that ran around the inside like a snake. She passed him half, and he began ripping out the old wire. He didn't try to talk, but she did. "Where'd you learn to be a radar tech?"

"Um, the South, uh, Harmonian Institute of Technology. It's like four systems from Coruscant, you're probably never heard of it." He grabbed at the wire again, enjoying how it would shred under his hands as he pulled it out.

"Really, you went to shit?"

"What?" He felt his voice rise in volume, then did his best to keep ahold of it. "I, uh, what?"

Rana gestured with her screwdriver as she spelled it out. "South Harmonian Institute of Technology? S, H, I, T?"

"Oh, uh, yeah I guess. I never really noticed. Their radar program was super advanced, like it only took a year for me to get through it."

"Not enough time to cover calcinators?" She said, smiling and giving a little laugh. Kylo felt his face go red again, watching her hands effortlessly rewire her half. His fingers felt large and clumsy as he worked on his. "Sorry, Matt. I was just joking. I'm sure it's a fine place. You only really find calcinators in these big systems anyway."

"I was top of the class. We had Kylo Ren come to recruit new members of the First Order." He glanced up as she finished her half. Her wire was smooth, all the curves perfect. He wanted to do nothing more than smash his, but she smiled as she took it from him.

"Really? I'd think he'd have better things to do. This looks great, Matt."

"Well, Kylo Ren cares about his workers, and he only wants the best. All the girls were practically falling over themselves when he showed up." He watched as she screwed the tube back together, then rewired it back into the system. "I bet if you went there, Ren would have picked you for the crew."

Rana snorted, getting up. "I'm not one for ensnaring guys." She held out a hand, obviously waiting for him to grab it. "Now come on, hopefully there's some muffins left."

He reached out, admiring the calluses on her palm, the result of hard work. "Do you like muffins?"

"Occasionally, now come on." She pulled him to his feet, "You'll have to lead the way. I'm not quite sure how to get back to the break room."

"I know how to get there." The maze of hallways and decks was simple to him, and he had them there in enough time to get the last of the muffins. Rana sat across from him, tearing her muffin half to eat it easier. He focused on his, but groaned when he heard Tim and Zack sit down by them.

"Enjoying your first day, Rana?" Zack said, drawing her into some small talk. Kylo seethed inwardly. Why couldn't he talk like that? Why couldn't he be so smooth, making her laugh like Tim did?

It was all he could do to keep a lid on the Force fueled frustration in him, but the coffee pot still exploded. It was only by sheer luck that no one was standing nearby, and only sanitation needed to be called and not medical. Rana watched them sweep it up. "That's weird, it was fine when I was over there."

Tim snorted. "That's the fifth in like two weeks."


	3. Chapter 3

On her way to lunch the next day Rey spotted Matt and quickly moved up to walk next to him. He seems particularly peeved for some reason, his mouth all screwed up. She gave him a little bump with her shoulder. "You alright, there?"

He glanced over, but then looked right bak at the ground. "Some jerk face kicked my wrench."

"Did you throw anything at him?"

"Um, should I have?" He looked over, like he was expecting her to teach him something.

"Next time, just pitch a screwdriver at the back of his head or something. Don't just lay there and take it." Rey stepped forward, activating the break room doors. She and Matt shuffled their way into line, ready to receive what ever goo they were being given today. "Hey, let me ask you something. Is your bunk like real cold? Is that a thing for us techs?"

"You're cold?"

"Well yeah, Cadinth isn't exactly Hoth." Rey shrugged her shoulders as she grabbed a tray. She'd had a little help forming her story, Cadinth was a desert planet, but not a scrapper's heap like Jakku. Enough to explain her tan, the Resistance intelligence officer had said, and anything desert related she might say unknowingly. "The heat's easy for me, the cold, not really." She looked back at Matt, but he seemed focused on his tray. She spotted Zack and Tim, both already eating. They didn't seem to mind sharing a table, and knew most of the gossip on the ship.

Matt suddenly spoke. "You guys like working here?"

Tim seemed more interested in his food than the question, but Zack replied. "You know, work is work."

Rey swallowed what tasted like overcooked Bantha. "I'm just here for the credits."

Matt looked up. "So, what do you guys think of Kylo Ren? Do you really believe him when he says that he's going to finish what Darth Vader started?"

Tim barely looked up from his food. "What exactly has he started?"

She couldn't help the snort that came out. "I can tell you he's not that popular with the repair techs. Apparently he'd have all sorts of temper tantrums and just destroy a bunch of equipment. They're all really glad he's been out on some mission for awhile."

Matt looked like someone had slapped him. "Really? But he's so, awesome."

Zack started gesturing with his fork as he talked. "Ya know, I will say this for Kylo, I think he gets a bad rap. Yeah, he's trying to accomplish something that's never been done before in the history of the galaxy. You know, rule everything? That's impressive I admire the guy."

"Yes. Exactly! Exactly." Matt seemed like he was about to jump out of his chair he was so excited. Rey just rolled her eyes. Of course he'd be a Kylo Ren fanboy. Force forbid anyone in the First Order be normal.

Tim snorted. "Friend of mine works in Sanitation, said he had to clean Kylo Ren's bathroom and the guy has like three different tubes of eyeliner."

Matt's hands started trembling. "Well, I'm, uh, sure it's for some, um, strategic thing. Maybe his mask gets a lot of glare or something." Matt looked like he was either going to break out in tears or tackle Tim form across the table.

Rey looked down at her data pad. Three new pings, all for repair on deck seven. "Might be it, back on Cadinth a lot of the guys wore it. Cuts the glare from the sun." She shifted her data pad into one hand and grabbed the tray with the other. "Sorry guys, got to go. See you later!"

* * *

Kylo found himself struggling under a load of blankets as he tried to find his way to the female tech bunks. He'd been able to slip into his old quarters and get his robes and mask to intimidate the commissary into giving the blankets to him. But Kylo would arouse interest if he'd taken the blankets down like that, so now he was Matt again. He stepped out of the lift and looked down the hallway.

The First Order may not have allowed bunk decoration, but he could feel feminine energy down here. He started down, finding a couple of techs chatting outside their bunks. He looked at them for a second, then back down. "Could you, uh, tell me where Rana is?"

They both pointed farther down the hall, on the right. He stumbled in that direction, thanking the Force itself that Rana had left her door open while she worked on her data pad. He looked over. "Hey, Kylo Ren said to bring you these."

Rana looked confused as she shifted herself off the small bunk. "You talked to Kylo Ren?"

"Yeah, I see him in the bathroom sometimes. I've even seen him without the mask. He's, um, pretty hot."

She reached out and took a few of the blankets. "And you talked to Kylo Ren, about how I was cold?"

Matt felt himself blush again. "He noticed you once, said you were doing good work and asked if I knew anything about you." He reached into a pocket, pulling out the note. "He even wanted me to give you this."

Rana opened it, reading aloud. "Matt said you were cold. Kylo." She closed it, looking up. "Well, that's, um, nice. I guess."

"He says you're a great asset to the First Order."

"Damn, you got blankets!" The two girls from earlier had made their way over. "Those would cost me like, half my credits to get. Most expensive thing in the commissary."

Rana chuckled. "You want one? There's got to be ten here."

They each accepted one, and Kylo had to seethe a little. She was just giving his present away? He watched as they folded them over their arms before they spoke again. "Hey, we were having a little debate. What do you prefer Rana, blond or brunette?"

Kylo suddenly realized that he was entering one of the most forbidden sectors to a man, female thought. Rana seemed to take a second to think. "Well, you know us brunettes have to stick together to save ourselves from the blond menace." She smiled at him. "No offense, Matt."

He felt himself both blushing and smiling, then he had to look down at his feet.

Rana finished with. "But I'll take anything that's not a redhead."

"Not a ginger fan?" The other girls started laughing.

Kylo felt awkward just standing there while the girls started chatting. He shifted away. "Well, uh, bye Rana. I'll save you a muffin, that is if you want one. I mean, uh, I will but you can eat what you want." He turned away, listening to the girls behind him.

"Oh, he's adorable."

"He's definitely crushing on you, Rana."

"Please, he's probably crushing on Kylo Ren."


	4. Chapter 4

**AN: Thank you guys so much for all your favorites, follows and especially, reviews! The scene this time comes from the SNL bloopers for the Undercover Boss sketch, which was pointed out to me by reviewer Cantare over on Ao3.**

* * *

Sure enough, Matt was waiting with a muffin the next morning. Zack and Tim weren't there, they usually ate a quick meal and after fixing one of the main hydraulic lines, Rey was pretty late to breakfast. Rey smiled, quickly pulling off the transparent wrap on the muffin. Matt watched. "Were you warm last night?"

She popped a section in and swallowed before answering. "Yeah, just like being back home." Actually she'd sat on her bed for an hour trying to figure out if Kylo Ren had blown her cover and she should just get the hell out. But the more she thought about, the safer she felt. She'd barely felt Ren's energy on the ship, and she would have known if he'd been picking at the Force shield she'd thrown over herself. And the energy of his that was there, it was practically dormant. Way less red to it than the last time she'd been on his ship. And she was warm under the blankets, enough to almost make her miss Jakku. Regardless of when she had to return to the Resistance, she was taking those blankets.

Matt tried a smile. "Great, I'll tell Kylo Ren you liked them."

Rey could't help the smirk on her face. "You do that, Matt." She finished her muffin and gave him a little pat on the shoulder as she left. She could feel him freeze under her hand, but she just rolled her eyes. He was a dork, but he was kind of sweet. If he only wasn't such a Kylo Ren fanboy, she might... Well, who knew. Maybe he'd get over his Kylo obsession and be willing to have a cup of coffee with her like a normal, albeit slightly awkward, person.

Rey prepared herself for another day of minor repairs. Despite her best efforts to snoop, all the _Finalizer_ did was stay in orbit over a planet. No moving, no jumps to light speed. Everything here seemed to be in standby, like the First Order was still figuring out what to do. But she had to find something. She couldn't return to General Organa and Master Luke with nothing but gossip about how two of the stormtroopers were involved with some of the upper officer corps. Finn would probably find it hilarious, especially the tidbit she'd picked up that Phasma spends her night polishing her armor by hand.

But nothing strategic, no plans, just repairs and maintenance.

The people at least were fine. They may have all been a little weird, but most of them seemed fairly nice. The more time she spent here, the more she wanted them to come over to the Resistance so she wouldn't have to think of them as the enemy. Especially Matt, that doofy guy wouldn't last a moment in a battle. Probably throw himself in front of a blaster bolt to save Kylo Ren.

She was still smirking when she entered the break room for lunch. Matt was standing by the door, staring at the wall. Someone had put up a poster of Kylo Ren, reading "Keep Calm and Kill the Resistance", and it had promptly been vandalized. Horns, an arrow through his head, Rey had a feeling it would have had a mustache if it would have shown up against the black mask. To compensate for that, several speech bubbles had been added.

 _Derp!_

 _I have no friends._

 _Cry-lo Ren._

Rey barely had time to react before Matt lunged toward the wall and tore the poster from it, yelling while he did. The whole break room watched as he shredded the poster, then smashed a trooper's tray from his hand and threw another's cup of blue milk at the wall before screaming. He turned to look at everyone. "Sorry, employees." His teeth were bared, and he almost seemed to be growling.

Rey stepped in. "Hey, Matt? Could you come help me with something?" She gestured back to the hallway. "Out there?" He walked, well more stalked, outside and she followed him. Once they were far enough from the break room she pulled him aside. "Matt, what was that back there?"

He was still breathing hard. "I, they, just." He punched his fist into the wall. "Oww."

Rey reached over and pulled his fist away from the steel wall. "Okay, let's try this again. Why did you have that freakout?"

"I, I just really respect him. And that they would just, just deface it. It hurts. It makes me mad that Kylo Ren wasn't there because he would have used the Force to just annihilate all of them!" Matt drew his hand back to punch the wall again.

Rey reached over and caught it.

* * *

She was holding his hand. Well not really holding, more like stopping him from punching. But he still felt his breath hitch a little as he turned to look at her. Oh, he was still angry. So angry he was surprised the break room hadn't exploded into smithereens. But something about being Matt made him calmer. Being around Rana made him calmer, she seemed so unlike the others. She never made fun of him, well, not to be mean. He felt more at peace as Matt and around her. Except for when the crew made fun of him. He could end them with a thought and they made him the butt of their jokes. They would never do that to Darth Vader.

He let his eyes drop from Rana. "I, you should just leave me alone. I'll be fine."

"Matt, it's alright if you're angry. But you shouldn't just smash people's food out of their hands."

"Why? They probably wrote it."

"Because it's not what you do to your co-workers." She smirked again. "Because then it might get back to General Hux and then who would save me muffins and show me around the ship?"

He felt a smile pulling at the edge of his lips. Was she saying she needed him? Or was she trying to say that someone else would help her? "Uh, Zack?"

She smiled, pulling his fist open so she could grasp his hand. "Please, Zack has too much to do and Tim just knows where the break room, his bunk and his guard post is." Her fingers were laced through his. "You're my friend and I don't want you to get fired for some outburst."

Oh Force, she had called him her friend. "That's, um, that's really nice."

"Are you still hungry?" She glanced back toward the break room. "I've got some nutrient bars in my pocket, you probably don't want to head back there for a little bit." She pulled out one of the packaged bars, offering it to him.

"Sure, I guess." He accepted one, and followed her example by sliding down the wall to sit. He tore it open, biting into the sugar drenched grain. It actually tasted better than what they were serving today, some strange reptile he hadn't seen. It was practically a given that it would be overcooked, so really, he did prefer this.

Rana was tearing through her own bar. Kylo had to suppress a chuckle. Her manners were deplorable, chewing with her mouth open and usually talking while she did it. But she didn't seem embarrassed by it. He looked down at the empty wrapper in his hands, playing with it. "You don't think that, Zack and Tim, that they'll make fun of me for that, right?"

She shrugged. "They might, but just let it roll off you. They'll find something else to talk about."

Like how Kylo Ren was apparently obsessed with blankets. He'd heard that from three different crew members today. Luckily no one seemed to connect Kylo Ren taking all the blankets with Rana suddenly having a trove of them. He crumpled the wrapper in his hand. "I heard today that Hux, the General, that he uses makeup. That's he's got freckles all over his face and he hates them."

Rana chuckled. "Really? Does he use eyeliner too?"

Kylo looked down. "Did you mean what you said, earlier, I mean? That guys back on your home, back on Cadinth, that they wear it?"

"Yeah, when I was there I wore a lot of it too. It really does help cut the glare from the sun."

"Do you, um, think that they, uh, look good with it?"

She gave another laugh. "Why, thinking about picking up some?"

He could feel the blush in his cheeks. "No, I was just thinking that if you liked it, the eyeliner, that you might like Kylo Ren. Err, I mean, think he was handsome. Since, you know, he wears it under the mask to help with the glare."

She didn't laugh, but instead gave him a look that practically went through him. "You know Matt, I think I'm good without seeing Ren unmasked." She looked down as her data pad gave a ping. "Damn, I've got to go." She braced herself against the wall and stood up. He got up too, watching her. Rana held her arms out, waiting. "Matt, give me hug."

Kylo tried to figure out if she had some anterior motive. Did she know it was him? Was she going to rip off his wig or stab him with a screwdriver? "Uh, why?"

"Because it what friend's do after they've helped each other." She replied, walking forward and wrapping her arms around him. He was suddenly struck by how much shorter she was, her head barely reaching his collarbone. He awkwardly folded his arms around her, imitating the little squeeze she gave him. When she pulled away he almost followed. "I'll see you later, Matt."

"Yeah, uh, bye." He stammered watching her walk away. He felt that stupid smile again and couldn't help it.

A couple officers walked by. "Something funny, technician?"

"No."

"No, sir."

He glared at the man. "No, sir." The officers started walking away, and Kylo could honestly say he had no idea why the floor waxing droid suddenly rushed in front of them, sending them down to the ground.


	5. Chapter 5

**AN: If you want to see Rey with her new hairdo and Kylo being a spazz as Matt, check out Doktor-Marceline's fan art! ask-doktor-marceline .tumblr post/137927210196/am-i-late-to-join-the-bandwagon-anyway-have-some**

 **Just remove the spaces and you should be good to go! And thank you Doktor-Marceline for my first ever** **fan art!**

* * *

Rey rolled her shoulders as she walked into the break room. She'd been in the TIE Fighter hanger all morning, helping weld a docking bay door back together after some pilot had smashed a wing into it. She hadn't even had breakfast, and was glad being on Jakku had made it a little easier for her to miss a meal every now and then. She saw Zack and Tim standing by the soda machine, and walked over to say hello.

Tim smirked. "Where's your shadow?"

"What?" Rey said, looking behind him. She could really go for a Dr. Pfebat right about now.

"Matt, he was here this morning and kept looking around like a kid trying to find his mommy. Haven't seen him since."

She wrinkled her nose. "I was caught up this morning. Some idiot slammed his TIE fighter into the bay door, threw the whole thing off its tracks and damn near smashed it in half." She walked up the machine and ran her fingers over the input. All it took was her employee number and it would deduct the credits out of her account.

Tim started laughing. "I saw him come out of there, Hux was so pissed he slapped the guy around right there! Demoted him too!" Tim pretended to wipe tears from his eyes. "You having lunch with us today, Rana?"

She was just twisting off the top of her Dr. Pfebat when she saw Matt, blonde hair disheveled like always. He was staring intently at Tim.

"Have you guys seen Kylo Ren's lightsaber?" Matt suddenly said, stepping extra close to Tim. Rey was suddenly struck by how much he towered over the trooper, practically leaning over the man.

Tim looked a little thrown off, but replied. "Yeah man, that thing's weird looking."

"No it's not, it's awesome. Here let me go see if I can find it, I'll show it to you." Matt spoke quickly, turning around and going right out the door. It had barely been two seconds before he came rushing back in, an activated lightsaber in his hand. Rey found herself unconsciously leaning away, even taking a few steps back. She'd been close enough to that before, she didn't need to be any closer now. Matt seemed especially proud of it, gesturing wildly. "Look, I found Kylo Ren's lightsaber." He shoved it right up in Tim's face, so close he could have shaved with it. Rey could see the red light from the blade reflected in Matt's huge glasses, and in his eyes. "Look at it up close."

Tim's eyes were fixed on the flickering blade, occasionally flashing up to Matt as if to make sure he wasn't going to stab him with it. "That thing looks dangerous, man. And poorly made, like a little kid made it."

"Then you don't have to look at it any more!" Matt yelled, flinging the lightsaber at the wall. A tech and a Stormtrooper had to duck as it flew past them, striking the wall with a shower of sparks. Rey could help but notice the sign on the wall.

 _We have gone 00 days without an accident._

Rana doubted the sign had every gotten higher than two days. On a ship this big, accidents were all too common. Matt stalked off after the fallen weapon, shoving his way past the stunned techs. Rey watched him, then turned back to Tim. "I'll be back, just let me go get Matt." She excused herself, following him. Matt was cradling the lightsaber, standing by the door. She walked up, a small smile on her face. "You alright, Matt?"

He screwed his mouth up. "They're all idiots. I mean, before Kylo Ren came up with the hilt, the Jedi and the Sith would lose hands all the time." He held out the lightsaber for her to see. "See? He came up with this genius idea to divert extra energy through here and protect his hands."

Rey watched him trace his fingers over the energy path. "That's impressive."

"And I know Kylo Ren worked really hard on it, and for them to just make fun of it like that." He glared at the group of people in the break room. "And none of them said anything positive." He dropped his gaze back down to the deactivated lightsaber. "I hate them. Especially Tim."

Rey rolled her eyes. "They were probably just scared, and Tim never thinks before he talks. Zack told me that Tim's got about twenty demerits for insubordination and back talk." She looked down at the lightsaber. "Now, why don't you go put that back where you found it before Ren destroys something and I have to go fix it." Matt seemed to smile, nodding his head like it was about to fall off as he left the break room. He was back in barely a minute, lightsaber gone. Rey smirked. "You want some lunch now?"

Matt looked over. "Do we have to sit with them?"

"We can sit together today if you want to."

* * *

Kylo felt himself go cold. Was this a date? Did having lunch count as a date? He felt his mouth work for a second. "Really? I would, uh, like that." He lost his nerve and looked away from Rana again. Rana with her hair braided like a Twi'lek, Rana with those brown eyes and smirking lips. Rana who smiled and laughed with him. He couldn't help that rage that overcame him when he saw Tim laughing with her, asking her to lunch. He wanted nothing more than to shove his lightsaber through that fat, loathsome man. He settled for making the man practically wet his armor.

"Great, hopefully they're serving something good today." She said, walking over to the line and grabbing a tray. Today's meal seemed to consist of a ground Bantha burger, fried Ryloth potatoes and some Wyllian corn. Kylo had to admit it was one of their better meals. They settled themselves at the end of a table, Rana sitting across from him. Her manners hadn't improved any, tearing into her burger like it was the first thing she'd eaten all day.

He wanted to ask her why she hadn't come in for breakfast this morning. He sat there until everyone else had left, hoping that she'd walk in the door and smile at him. But she hadn't, and he'd been in a foul mood since. He tried voicing his thoughts. "I was, um, waiting for you this morning."

"Oh, Tim told me. I'm sorry Matt, I had to go help on a repair." She smiled around a mouthful of potatoes. "I hope you didn't let work pile up while you were waiting for me." Truth be told, he had. But the pings went out to all the radar techs, and they all seemed to specify that they wanted any tech but Matt.

"It, it wasn't that busy this morning." He reached for his cup of blue milk, watching her finish her meal.

"Well, they gave me the rest of the day off since I had to help with that this morning, so why don't we hang out the rest of the day?" Rana said, mopping up the last of her burger.

That was definitely a date. He'd heard troopers complain about how women gave off so many different signals, but they seemed to agree on one thing. If a woman wanted to spend time with you outside of work, she was interested. He felt that stupid blush again. "Sure, that, um, sounds fun." He stood up, and reached out a hand. "Do you want me to, uh, take your tray?"

"Sure, then we'll go find somewhere to hang. I heard there's a holovision somewhere." She handed him her tray, then sprang right to her feet. He knew the holovision she was talking about, it was up in the officer's lounge. He should be able to get them in, then shut the door off.

"Yeah, Kylo Ren told me. He said I could use it if I wanted to." He put the trays in the wash, "It's up on fifteen." They went to the turbolifts, taking them up fairly high. The officer's lounge was near them, and Kylo quickly tapped in the code to open the door. The lounge was much better appointed than the break room, couches and cushions arranged around the holovision.

Rana quickly jumped over the back, bouncing on the cushions. "These are so soft!" Kylo quickly slammed in a code that would only allow the door to open from inside and joined her. She stretched her legs out in front of her, her arms over her head. Kylo couldn't help the little glance as she arched her back. That jumpsuit may not show much, but it showed some. Rana caught his eyes. "Matt."

"Sorry." He quickly ducked his head. He fumbled around the cushions for a moment before coming up with the remote. "Here, let's find something." He ran through he frequencies, passing news, cartoons, and who knew what else until he settled on a daytime drama from Coruscant.

Rana perked up. "What's going on?"

On screen a human was bemoaning the fate of her Aruzan lover, who had gone away to fight for his people. Kylo rolled his eyes. "Dilea, the woman, she's sad because her boyfriend, Terauna, left her because he thinks she doesn't love him any more. When actually it was Diana, Dilea's evil identical twin who told him that."

Rana reached over and lightly smacked his shoulder. "You watch this?"

Kylo looked down. Of course he watched these daytime dramas. Buried far back in his mind he could remember Leia watching this exact series, telling him what was going on as he sat on her lap. He didn't keep watching them out of sentimental reasons of course, he just got bored on the ship and needed something to do. On screen Diana, distinguished from her sister by an eyepatch had entered. She gestured expansively, "And now, Diliea, you will hand over control of our family's mine if you ever want to see Terauna again!"

Dilea brought her hands up to her face. "Diana, by the Force, I thought you were dead!" She rushed to the sister, hugging her.

Diana shoved her away. "I only faked my death, Kilio my Cathar friend supplied the body you thought was me!"

Rana reached over and tapped him again. "They're fighting over a mine?"

Kylo wanted to reach out and grab her hand, then pull her close while they watched. He also wanted her to be quiet. He'd been missing this every since he'd been demoted to Matt and he hadn't caught up on the plot. "Their father owned a massive groznium mine, he left it to Dilea when he died. Diana got the family fortune but spent it all on clothes. Dilea found a new rare metal in the mine and she now has ten times what the original fortune was."

Rana scooted closer, pressing herself up against his side. Was he supposed to put his arm round her? Is that what was expected on dates? Kylo suddenly found himself wishing he'd packed some mints in his vest. Rana pointed back at the screen where the two sisters were struggling in a fight. "So is she going to kill her?"

"More than likely Kilio will come in and hold Dilea down while Diana tries for a finishing blow before finding she can't hurt her sister." He replied, then watched almost exactly that played out. The episode ended with the sisters declaring their reconciliation, but the promo for the next one made it obvious it wasn't going to last. Rana started at the sudden banging on the door.

"Who ever is in there, open this door! This is General Hux!" He punctuated this with another slam of his fist against the door.

Kylo stood up, slamming the open code into the opposite door. He gestured for Rana to go. "Get back down."

"Matt, he'll fire you."

"I can talk my way out, I'm pretty sure. Kylo Ren told me I could use this place, he'd probably chew Hux out for me." He looked over toward the door. "But you need to get out."

She looked at him, before running up and hugging him. "I'll hold Hux down, if you need me to."

He gaped for a minute. "It's, um, it's alright." He watched her leave, running for the turbolifts. The door slammed closed, and he quickly pulled off the blonde wig and the glasses. He stashed them under a chair as he drew himself up and walked to the door. He quickly entered the code, pinning the frostiest glare he could on Hux. "Is there a problem, General?"

Hux sneered. "You know the officer's lounge is to be kept open at all times. What were you doing Ren, enjoying some intergalactic delights?" The door regulation was not meaningless. Rey couldn't count the number of times they'd found officers in here fooling around or viewing some personal videos on the holovision.

"What I do should not be any of your business."

"Then obey the regulations and I won't have to deal with it."

Kylo tried to hold back from Force choking him.

Huh still raised a hand to his throat like it had become a little harder to breathe.


	6. Chapter 6

Rey was surprised to see Matt in one piece the next morning. His face didn't even look red, Hux had a tendency to smack around subordinates who went too far out of line. At least, that was the rumor. The other end was that he saved them as test subjects for the new torture droids that were being shipped over. Tim had easily a dozen different rumors on what Hux did with employees who stepped out of line, but none of them ever seemed to agree on what he did exactly. Rey snatched a muffin for herself and tossed another to Matt. "You made it out alive."

He smiled, fingers wrapped around the muffin. He did have long fingers, Rey reflected. "Yeah, Kylo Ren showed up and totally tore Hux a new one."

Rey gave a chuckle as she unwrapped her breakfast. At least they had a few varieties of muffins to pick from. "Maybe we should stay out of there. Kylo Ren can't show up and save your ass every time."

"You didn't like it?" He sounded like someone had just kicked him.

Rey held up her hands. "No, I did! It was a lot of fun, I just don't want you getting in trouble." Truth be told, it had been fun. Matt was obviously familiar with the show, and it had been funny to see him focused so intensely on something so trivial. It had been even funnier to distract him from it, and she did enjoy how he immediately lost focus when she had scooted over to him. A part of her had almost wished he had put his arm around her and pulled her closer, but standing up to Hux was a good deal braver.

"You, you don't?"

Rey rolled her eyes. Men, they never held onto anything. Hell, Finn had to be told ten times what a tool was called. "I've told you before, if you get fired who's going to keep me sane on this ship?"

"Hmm." Matt tore at his muffin with his fingers. "Do you want to do that again? Hang out, I mean?"

Rey popped half the muffin in her mouth. "I don't know if I'll have the time."

"I could-" Matt cut off as he turned around. One of the Stormtrooper captains had just entered, a clipboard in his hand. The entire break room seemed to quiet as the captain walked to the center of the room.

His voice filtered through his mask. "In light of our extended stay above Hyana, crew will be granted one day of shore leave. The list here," he held up the clipboard, "details who will leave in which groups on which days. You will wait at your assigned bay at 0600 on your assigned day." The trooper left the clipboard on a table, moving swiftly out of the break room. The door had barely closed before the clipboard was swarmed by techs. Rey quickly raced over, feeling Matt follow her.

It was times like this where she hated being short, but Matt came in handy there. He squinted behind his glasses. "We're scheduled for tomorrow, leaving out of bay 4." Rey gave a little whoop, holding up her hand to high five him. Matt just stared until she grabbed his hand and pulled it up to smack it. He stood there, looking at her. "Can, can we hug?"

Rey felt her eyebrows go up. "Really?" In response she gave him a quick hug, then joined in the general celebration with the rest of the techs. Not that there was much. All it seemed to be was an extra serving of blue milk and some nutrient bars. But there was a atmosphere of happiness, group of techs forming up to discuss what they planned to do. Apparently there was some shopping on Hyana, and most planned to buy gifts for family or items for themselves. Rey couldn't wait. She never counted on how boring this ship would be. A few books would be greater than anything she could think of.

Anything to get a few hours away from the never-ending repairs and fixes that seemed to consume her day.

Matt had stuffed a couple of bars in his vest and was fighting with getting the pockets to close over them. Rey sidled over, tapping his shoulder. "What are you going to do with our day off?"

He hesitated, eye blinking quickly behind his glasses. "Um, what are you planning?"

"Well, apparently there's some shopping."

"Do you," he looked down, "Do you think we could, um, go out?" Rey's jaw must have dropped because Matt started backpedaling. "Not if you don't want to! I mean, it's fine. If you don't want it to be a date. I can go do something else, um, really far away from what you're doing. Or I can come and carry what you buy."

Rey took a moment. From what Luke had told her, the Jedi of old had no romantic attachments. But he'd never said anything about her not being allowed. And well, it was Matt. He was nice, harmless. Rather easy to embarrass, and awkward. But he was sweet, underneath his anger at practically everyone. He just took a bit to show it. She'd be leaving soon, and she may as well make Matt happy for the short time left. She pretended to consider it, putting her hand to her chin like she was deep in thought. "Sure, if you want."

"I can carry your stuff?"

"The date, Matt. It's fine. We can go out." Rey smirked as he turned a shade of red brighter than any star. Her data pad pinged from her belt, calling her away. Engine blew a steam hose, and she needed to be down there right now. "It'll be fun." She gave him another quick hug, waving as she went out. "See you!"

* * *

Kylo would confess that had been heavily distracted as he went off to work. Asking Rana out had been harder than a lot of things he had done, and it was especially difficult as Matt. Kylo saw himself as a suave, dark and mysterious man who would have easily enchanted her and won her almost immediately. But as Matt, as Matt he suddenly found himself tongue-tied and second guessing every single word that came out of his mouth.

And now he had himself half buried under wires, his legs sticking out of the open panel as he rooted around for whatever the supervisor was yelling at him to find now. The main resistor line? It was something like that, but whoever had run these wires had obviously been tutored by some Sith lord in the power of chaos. He thought he had managed to find it, and tried to tug it out to work on.

The wire responded by at first staying put, then breaking in half when he tugged it. While he had never felt Sith lightning, he had a feeling this was what it was like. "Shit!" He found himself cursing as he instinctively jumped back from the shock, bashed his head against the ceiling, and felt his hand land back on the wire, which, while it did' shock him, still tore up him hands. He struggled back out of the panel, only for the door to get knocked right into his nose as he turned around. at this point he didn't much care for what his supervisor was yelling at him about now, not with blood gushing out his hand and nose and a lump the size of a livi fruit forming on his head.

His supervisor didn't seem to care. "Where's the transistor line, Matt?" Kylo felt his teeth grind. She said his name like she said a curse word. "You can't even find the transistor line? What kind of radar tech can't find the transistor line?" She threw her arms up, as if asking the Maker why she'd been cursed with him.

"Can I go to medical, to fix this?" He asked, holding up his bloody hand.

The supervisor tapped away on her data pad. "No, you can wait until another tech shows up and explain to them why you can't find the transistor line." With that, she walked away, joking with a Stormtrooper as she left. Kylo tipped his head back as he waited, doing his best to mop up whatever blood leaked out with his sleeve. He sat there, waiting. How did he come to this? He was the Master of the Knights of Ren. She should have thrown that supervisor backwards and choked her like the worm she was. He started coming up with new, inventive ways of dealing with her while he waited. He'd just tried to figure out some kind of rope system that would suspend her over a Sarlacc, but keep her from falling in.

"Damn, Matt. What happened?" Rana came around the corner, hands dropping to the tool belt on her waist. "Did you lose a fight?"

He watched as she pulled a rag from her belt. "Is that clean?"

"Yeah, it is." She replied as she knelt down by him. First she took his hand, gently mopping up the blood with a corner of the rag. Then she brought it up and proceeded to clean the blood from his face. Kylo had to admit, he liked that. The way her hands were gentle and kind of cradled his head as she did it. From another pocket on her belt came a small spray can. She quickly sprayed his hand, before shoving the can back in her pocket. "Little adhesive, should keep it together until we can get you to medical for some antibac." At that point, she looked behind him. "Why does this utility duct look like a ranthor threw up in it?"

Kylo turned himself around, looking back at the tangle of wires. "It was that way when I got here." He watched Rana crawl into the hole and fumble around for a bit. She finally crawled back out, and the wires were now organized and the one that had shredded his hand had been wrapped in tape to hold it together. He sniffed a little blood back up. "I kind of hate you right now."

She only smiled. "Hey, it's just like my hair. Have to get everything organized." She dusted her hands off, then reached down and pulled him to his feet. "Now, let's get you to medical so you don't bleed out before our date." They stumbled to the turbolifts, going down a deck to get to the medical bay. It was staffed almost entirely by medi-droids, one of whom cleaned his hand again before spraying it with antic and wrapping it in a bandage.

Its sensors quickly went over the lump on the back of his head. "Only medium bruising, no expected concussion. I recommend bedrest for the rest of the day." The droid quickly turned away as a Stormtrooper staggered in, his helmet on backwards. Another droid came over to shoo them out while they attended to the trooper. Rana seemed pleased, and insisted on walking him back to his bunk.

Kylo wished she wouldn't. He knew the pictures he'd taken from the security cameras, the ones of the two of them at lunch and her working on a piece of equipment, were safely tucked away. He kept them under his bunk, sometimes when he would get angry he would pull them out and remember how calm he felt around Rana. But he felt he would rather curl up and die than let her know he'd been mooning over her. So when they ended up in front of his bunk, he quickly stepped in and blocked her. "Um, I'll see you tomorrow." He worried at the bandage on his hand. "For our, uh, date."

Rana leaned over, and he almost backed up before he felt her lips on his cheek. "See you tomorrow, Matt." She sauntered off, leaving him standing there, holding his cheek.


	7. Chapter 7

The hanger was filled with about a hundred techs, grouped around the boxy transport shuttles. She quickly found Matt, it was easier since he was out of the official First Order jumpsuit. She could still pick him out by his height and messy blond hair if need be. Rey was surprised the First Order let him get away with that, everyone else always seemed to be perfectly coiffed.

Except for Tim, he always seemed a little messy.

The other techs on their flight were laughing, obviously glad to be going off the ship for a bit. Matt was standing away from them, wearing a dark red shirt and khaki pants that Rey had seen in the commissary. Rey had found herself buying a similar outfit, only with a blue shirt.

The First Order didn't have much fashion sense outside of the uniforms.

"Rana, you, you look nice." Matt said, nodding to her.

"Same to you, Matt." She replied, stepping up closer to him, fully intent on messing with him today. She couldn't help it, he was too cute when he got flustered. He stepped away a little, turning to watch the Stormtrooper who had arrived to usher them onto the transport. The techs filed in, holding onto the supports on the ceiling as the transport used its repulsers to lift away from the hanger floor and head out into space. The pilots steered them down through the atmosphere with minimal turbulence, eventually setting down at a spaceport near the planet capital, Gerani.

The stormtrooper guard headed to the front, "You must be back by 1700, and you all must wear your locator bracelets." He held up a box, which was quickly passed around. Rey went to pull one out, but Matt passed the box around her.

After fumbling with his, he held out one for her. "I thought it might be easier." He muttered as he quickly twisted the bracelet around her wrist, latching it together. It wasn't much to look at, bulky and black, but it held a position indicator which would tell their guard exactly where they were. The spaceport was only a brief walk from Gerani's high end shopping district, and Rey quickly found a new game to play.

Find the most expensive thing she could.

They made their way through several stores, each more ridiculous than the last. Matt got a little fed up when they went to a men's store where the entire collection seemed to be based on artfully placed feathers. Rey had found herself doubled over when they found a mannequin wearing only a single feather, curled around its waist, everything it was supposed to be hiding perfectly visible under the quills. Now they were in a dress shop, that seemed to feel the less fabric involved, the higher the price should be. Rey held up a very sheer, very sparkly dress that seemed to be held together with only the thinnest of threads. Matt tilted his head as he looked at it. "You would wear that, if you could?"

She couldn't help the little snort. "Little to much for me. Or rather, little to less." She flipped over the tag. "Five thousand credits." She grabbed Matt's arm as they moved on. "We need to leave, they may just get mad at me for touching it."

He laughed, but it seemed a tad too robotic. "Did you like the clothes in there?"

"Nah, too thin. I'd rather keep wearing my jumpsuit." Rey said as they exited onto the main drag. Souped up speeders were parked along the road, occasionally attended to by a very subservient valet. They didn't pay much attention to her and Matt, their very clothes marking them as lower class than what was expected. They walked further into the city, coming to the more middle class area. Rey finally found a bookstore, and proceeded to drag Matt inside.

She had never pegged Matt as a history nerd, but he seemed to drift to that section. Rey found a couple fiction books she thought sound good, including a rather risqué romance she was planning on slipping in Matt's bunk when they got back. She finally found Matt, sitting in a chair with a mountain of books in front of him. Rey looked down at the titles. All seemed to have something to do with the Empire or the Clone Wars, and most of them seemed focused on Anakin Skywalker or Darth Vader. She looked down at Matt, currently engrossed in the preface of one of the books.

"Big Darth Vader fan?" She asked, sitting on the arm of his chair. "I don't know how you can afford all of these."

Matt barely looked up. "I don't, don't really buy anything else." Rey reached over and grabbed one of them, flipping through. With Matt so focused on the other book, he didn't seem to notice as she slipped the romance in, opened to one of the steamier sex scenes. She handed it over to Matt, "This one looks good."

He blushed so hard the tips of his ears seemed to steam. He pulled the romance from the book, holding it between his thumb and forefinger like it was a rotting carcass. "You actually read that?"

"Well I have to get some entertainment on that ship." Rey reached over and laid her arm across his shoulders, bringing her lips up to his ear. She affected her best throaty whisper, letting her lips graze his ear. "Not that you don't do a fine job of it."

Matt shot out of the chair so fast she wound up sprawling in it, the book her had been reading underneath her. Rey burst out laughing, while Matt seemed to grow even more sheepish. "Sorry. You, um, surprised me."

Rey quickly picked herself up, helping gather the pile of books he had. "It's alright, but if you can afford all of these I'm going to grab a few more."

"Why?"

"Because you're buying me a present." Rey tried to give a playful smile, but Matt seemed confused. "You don't have to, I was just joking."

Matt reached out, fumbling as he grasped her hand. "No, I'd like to."

* * *

Kylo felt fairly good as he walked with Rana back to the spaceport, loaded down with books and a few knickknacks. Luckily the spaceport was willing to hold onto anything they brought until they left. He looked around at the high end restaurants, trying to find one that looked good. He'd like to take Rana somewhere nice, but he also didn't want his cover to get blown. He'd barely managed at the bookstore, and he had remembered the shiver that ran up his spine when Rana had whispered in his ear. He wanted to do a thousand different things to her then. Hold her down and kiss her, tell her how she made him feel, offer to buy the entire store for her if only she would do that again.

But in the end he had just pushed himself away, too embarrassed to actually do anything.

He hated himself for that.

While Rana chatted with the spaceport employee who would watch their stuff, he shuffled over to one of the loaders working on a freighter. "Do, do you know any, uh, good restaurants? Cheap?"

The guy looked at him, then over to the Rana. "Looking for a place for you and your girlfriend?"

"Yes."

"Try Three Hearts in midtown. Good Coruscanti place." The guy shuffled off with his load, leaving Kylo alone. He watched the ships come and go until Rana came back over. She linked her arm through his.

"I found a restaurant." He mumbled, setting off back towards the town.

"Good, I'm starving!" Rana smiled, her legs moving quickly to keep up with him. They made their way back through the upper end of town, and he debated whether or not to rent a speeder to get them there. But then he wouldn't get to walk with her. So he consented to walking, occasionally asking for directions from passerby. They finally found it, a set of dark windows hiding the well appointed interior. It may have looked amazing when it was brand new, but it still looked fairly good broken in like it was now.

They ordered quickly, the waitress quickly leaving them alone. Rana seemed nervous, tapping her fingers on the table. Kylo looked at her from across the table. "So, what, um, do we do?"

Rana's tapping paused. "I'm not really sure, you're the one who watches those dramas. Don't you know?"

"They never really go over the mechanics of a date. Usually they sit down, and then they declare their love for each other before the drinks come." He felt like ducking his head, she was smiling again and he felt like he would melt into the floor. He didn't think it could get worse than when she had slipped that romance novel in his book, but he could still feel her lips on his ears as she whispered.

"I like you, Matt, but I'm not quite ready to do that." She said, quickly interrupted by their food. He switched his focus to that, wanting to smack himself. He had summoned all his courage to ask for this date, and now he couldn't manage to actually use it to get to know her? Kylo tried to think about what his mother had said about women. But nothing came to him, all it did was make the pain in his head worse as he suddenly felt a massive pull from the Light Side. So he mumbled his way through some meaningless conversation, quickly paying the bill when it came.

He held the door open for Rana, following her back towards the spaceport until she suddenly ducked down an alley. He looked around the corner, and felt Rana's hands on his arms drawing him further into it. "Matt, are you alright?"

Kylo found himself unable to speak. He merely shook his head.

"It's alright you know. It was a good date." She reached up, her hand on the side of his face. "You know what happens at the end of dates, don't you?" That he knew, and she seemed to as well. Her head was tilted back, and he pressed his lips to hers. Was he doing this right? Did she like it? He wanted to pull the glasses off his face and crush them. But then he felt her hands on his face, and he found his slipping to her waist. That was what they did in the dramas, and usually the girl almost fainted after an amazing kiss. But Rana seemed strong, although she was starting to press herself up against him. He liked that, pulling her closer. She suddenly gave a little gasp, falling limp in his arms. Kylo looked down at her, feeling a little proud.

Until he noticed the dart in her neck.

He felt a quick pain in his side, then his legs crumpled out from underneath him. He tried to draw from the Force to support him, but overtime he reached for it, it slipped away. A man stepped out from the shadows in the alley, looking at the two of them. Kylo tried to move his hands, but it took all he had to keep his eyes open. The man spoke, revealing a set of yellowing teeth. "Healthy, young pair. Should fetch a good price."

Kylo felt his eyes close.


	8. Intermission With Hux

Hux decided he was definitely not getting paid enough for this. He enjoyed the power, the respect that came with the title General, but sometimes the responsibilities drove him mad. He was suddenly privy to every single problem on the ship, no matter how small. The engineers were tired of the custodial staff trying to polish the floor in the engine room, a squadron of Stormtroopers had angered the launderers and now stunk because the clothes under the armor weren't getting washed.

And now he was having to deal with missing personnel.

They'd received a holo from one of the Stormtrooper guards on the planet, informing him that two techs were missing and he had tracked their location to an alley, only to find the locator bracelets had been cut off and left by a pile of trash. He'd promptly ordered a troop of guards to the mayor's office, and had him shuttled aboard the _Finalizer_.

Hux stepped into the conference room, eyeing the perspiring man in the chair. "Would you care to tell me why two of my techs have disappeared, in your city?"

The man pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and began mopping his forehead, discoloring his face as he wiped away layers of makeup he had obviously applied. Underneath his skin was sallow, wrinkled and blotchy. "Perhaps they deserted?"

"First Order personnel do not desert." Hux reached over and removed the handkerchief from his hand, throwing it to the floor. "But if you're suggesting they are, perhaps we might discuss the contract assuring your city's protection by the First Order."

The man blanched. "We, we may have had some issues recently. Minor ones, really. Nothing a great general like yourself should be concerned about."

"What issues?"

"Some small kidnappings, the city guard has been looking into it. Maybe ten in the last week. A very small amount when compared to the millions of people in Gerani."

Hux gestured for one of the troopers to smack the mayor across the head. "And you didn't feel the need to tell us this, right before we allowed our crew leave?" Hux pinched his nose, exhaling deeply. "Get him out of my sight. Put him in a cell, then get me the people closest to the techs. Leave is cancelled until we've found them and dealt with the kidnappers." The troopers saluted, then roughly grabbed the mayor and pulled him out of the room.

A few minutes later there was a hesitant knocking. A brown haired Lieutenant Colonel poked his head in the room. "You wished to see me, sir?"

Hux looked over. "Your name and rank?"

"Lieutenant Colonel Zack, sir." He stepped into the room. "I was the closest officer to Matt and Rana."

"How much did you know them?"

"Fairly well, we met for lunch most days. Both were new, Matt showed up one day and Rana arrived on a shuttle from Pii when we picked up new crew."

"Their loyalty?"

"They've never spoken out against the First Order. Rana made it clear she was just here for work. Matt is something of a Kylo Ren fan."

"Really?"

"To be frank, sir. I'm ninety percent sure Matt is Kylo Ren."

"How so?"

Zack cracked a smile. "He constantly praises the man, and he showed up with his lightsaber one day at lunch."

"And the girl, Rana?"

"Competent tech, always seemed stuck to Matt. I think I heard they were going on a date during their leave."

"Do you think they've," Hux almost rolled his eyes up, "eloped?"

"No, sir."

"You're dismissed Lieutenant Colonel." Hux turned his back, looking down at his data pad. A few taps brought up a photo of Matt, and Hux wanted to slap himself. Apparently Ren thought a wig and a pair of glasses would be able to hide him. What was worse was that Hux hadn't even noticed, only too glad to have Ren out of his hair for a while. And now he'd gone and gotten himself kidnapped.

Hux considered his options. The mayor would have to be made an example of, that was no question. Phasma would be more than pleased to deal wit that. But should he order the _Finalizer_ out to hunt down the kidnappers? Currently they were on a month long refueling and resupplying stop, and barely a quarter of their fuel cells had been replaced. He could send a squadron of TIE fighters, but they could easily move out of com link distance.

There was always the possibility that Ren could deal with it himself. But it might reflect badly on Hux if the Supreme Leader heard that he did nothing to rescue the Master of the Knights of Ren. He opened his com link and contacted Phasma. "Get me a list of every ship that arrived and left the spaceport today."

"Immediately, sir."

It was a few minutes before his data pad pinged, the list displayed brightly. He scanned through it, noting that most of the ships appeared to be freighters. He sent it on down to the analysts, ordering them to contact each freighter and enquire about the cargo and their destination. But there were also many private ships. Those were not required to disclose their cargo, which would mean multiple calls to ships probably in hyperspace. They could already be halfway across the sector, too far to do anything immediate even if they did find them.

Hux pressed his fingers to his temples. Even when Ren wasn't here, he was still driving him up a wall.


	9. Chapter 9

Rey felt herself coming back slowly, her head rising up and down. Her eyes were still heavy, and she felt exposed. She closed her eyes, concentrating on the Force. Her cloak was gone, anyone who knew how to sense the Force could sense her. But there was something more, a thread leading away from her. She groped at the thread, following it with her mind. It led somewhere dark, somewhere quiet. She let go of it, the strain to follow it to much. A distant vibration was going through the floor, engines, she realized, operating at high speed. Rey opened her eyes with some difficulty, taking in the tiny room she'd been stuffed in. Matt was leaning against the wall, his hands bound in steel cuffs. Her head was laying on his chest, his breath soothing her, lulling her back to sleep. It seemed so easy, going back to sleep on Matt's chest.

Except it wasn't Matt.

His hair was black, the now obvious blonde wig on the floor by him, along with his glasses. Rey felt herself go stiff, remembering the face. It was Kylo Ren, breathing heavily as whatever sedatives they'd been shot full of worked their way out. Was he who the Force thread was leading too?

 _You're awake._ It was his voice, in her head. The thread of Force energy fairly hummed with it. She recoiled, trying to force him from her mind, grabbing desperately for any power left in her to repel him. He mentally chuckled. _It won't work, you can't block the Force bond. I should have realized it was you from the start. Scavenger._

Rey couldn't help the anger in her mind. _My name is Rey._

 _Rey. A strange name._

 _Any stranger than Kylo Ren?_ Rey felt her eyes close again. _What is a Force bond?_

 _A link between two Force users, it was probably established when I tried to force my way into your mind. Our continued contact under our assumed identities only strengthened it. I can feel what you feel, and you can feel what I feel._ She felt him chuckle under her head. _I told you that you needed a teacher, Luke must be slipping if he never mentioned it._

Rey tried moving her hands, only succeeding in twitching her fingers. She had steel cuffs on too, restricting her movements. _We can discuss that later. What happened?_

 _Well, after you kissed me, from what I saw a gang of slavers grabbed us. My guess, we're on their ship on the way to the Outer Rim. Law and order has been hard to establish out there. The New Republic never seemed to make it a priority._ Kylo shifted under her. _How much of the Force can you access?_

Rey focused, feeling the shifting power in her. It was hardly any, seeming to shift away every time she tried to grab it. _Not much._

 _I can only feel the barest hint. Unfortunately, we're going to need to work together to get out of here._ Kylo shifted, his arms shaking as he held up his bound wrists. "First," his voice was hoarse, barely a whisper. "these cuffs."

Rey tried speaking, barely managing to move her lips. "How?"

 _Focus on our bond. We should be able to draw more power through it. Feel it, draw it in, and focus on the cuffs. We should be able to break them._ He had switched back to his mental voice, apparently giving up on speaking. Rey wanted to cringe, but she plunged her mind into the bond. It wasn't really a thread, more like a braid of energy. She assumed the cool blue energy was hers, and the dark roiling thread was Kylo's. She focused on it, and the dark thread became clearer. It wasn't just dark, that was only the predominant layer. Beneath it was twisting grey, and a line of light that pulsed under her gaze.

She breathed in, feeling more of the Force come flooding back. It was coming to her, all she had to do was direct it. She focused on the cuffs, the locks that held them closed. The Force followed, turning around in the locks until with a sudden click, they came off. Rey felt like she'd never been knocked out. She could move easily, and she shook off the cuffs from her hand. Kylo snapped the chain binding his, letting them dangle from his wrists. He turned to her. "Now we have to get out."

"The door." Rey said, moving towards it to try and figure out its circuitry. It opened, and Kylo held up a hand.

"Do you commonly forget you have the Force?" He asked, making his way through. "Now, give me a moment." He walked out, pausing in the hallway. Rey wanted to snarl as she followed him, waiting until he finished whatever he was doing.

 _I need you to join with me, my power has not returned fully._ He whipped towards her. "Now!" Rey felt herself plunge into the bond, and he directed her energy outwards. She could feel the four other people on the ship, two of them together but the other two off on their own. One was coming towards them, and she felt Kylo's hand on her arm as he drew her around a corner. "Quiet."

His energy lashed out at the being, dragging Rey's with it. She could feel the thread of the Force wrap around the person's throat, tightening, shutting off its airways. The being fell to the ground, and Rey yanked herself away, pulling Kylo back with her. She could feel him driving back towards the prone figure. "Enough!" She yelled, "You don't have to kill him!"

Kylo looked angry, but he instead stalked down the hallway and dragged the unconscious woman to the cell they had recently left. Rey searched her pockets, coming up with the keys to the cuffs. He waited, his hands stiff as she unlocked the cuffs on his wrists. He looked at the cell, then gestured with his hand. The door slammed shut, locking her in. "There's three left. Come on." He made his way through the ship, occasionally drawing on their bond to pin down a location. Rey let him, but she kept him from killing any of them. Finally, they were the only two left aware, looking around the cockpit. The blue-purple tube of hyperspace was beyond, the navigation computer still set on what ever heading had last been entered. She watched Kylo settle himself down in the pilot's chair, hands ghosting over the controls.

She crossed her arms. "Do you know how to fly this thing?"

"Yes." He said, twisting the yoke around. He seemed surprised when it refused to budge. Rey rolled her eyes, then stepped over to the computer and canceled its current program. Hyperspace faded, the lines of the stars shrinking to pinpoints. "Really?"

Kylo stood up, towering over her. "I assume you can fly it."

Rey glared up at him. "Yes."

"Then get us back to Hyana."

* * *

He was infuriated as he watched her effortlessly reroute the ship, sending them back into hyperspace. He sat in the co-pilot's chair, reaching for their bond. Every time he touched it, he felt a little bit of the peace in her roll over him. It was more addicting than spice, or fine Correllian brandy. It just felt so good for the pain in his mind to ease. He supposed that was why he had sticked around her when she was Rana. Covering herself with the Force had hidden her, but her energy had still soothed him. He glanced around the cockpit, finding a small journal tucked in the sear cushion. It detailed the crew's transactions, including their capture of two humans, one male, one female, in Gerani. A few notes were written in the margin.

 _Spice mine for the male, brothel for female? Sell as breeders to Crymorah syndicate? Ransom to First Order? Low chance of decent price, high chance of being blasted to bits._

He didn't feel bad about tearing it in half, then pitching it over his shoulder. If Rana, Rey, had a problem she didn't show it, focused as she was on piloting them back. He had to admire her hand on the controls, skilled and calm. He flew, but mostly smaller craft. He enjoyed the speed, the quick turns and flashing laser blasters. But Rey seemed fine flying anything. She'd probably taken apart all kinds on Jakku.

"Why were you disguised as Matt?" She said, fingers flipping through switches on the dash.

"A punishment, for not killing Han Solo." Disappointment curled in his gut. "Why were you disguised as Rana?"

"A test. From Luke." She replied. Kylo exhaled deeply, trying to calm himself as she spoke again. "I was supposed to hide from you as long as I could."

"Well, you did amazingly well. All of what, five minutes?"

"I liked you better when you were Matt."

"And I liked you better as Rana."

She grew quiet, her brows coming together. "I saw your energy, through the bond. You may try and pretend that you're all Kylo Ren, that you're all dark. But I saw some light in you. Ben Solo isn't dead. But there was more gray than light or dark. Maybe Matt is the gray in you."

He held himself back from throttling her when she said his birth name. He knew it was still in him, the light. He looked inward, searching for the Force that flowed through him. "Let me guess, you want me to go back to being Ben?"

"Maybe, eventually. Your parents do miss you, you know. But, you seemed a lot happier when you were Matt."

"I was weak as Matt, made fun of. Ridiculed!" He stood, raking his hands through his hair. He could feel his anger lashing out, saw her flinch as it reacher her through the bond.

"You were my friend as Matt." She muttered, leaning back in the chair. "It was Matt that I kissed."

Kylo unclenched his fists, feeling her disappointment through the bond. "He's dead. Just like Ben Solo."

Rey leapt to her feet, her finger poking him in the chest. "No, he's not. Matt is still in you. And I know how to find him." Boosting herself up on the chair, she kissed him. Kylo tried to lean away, but she followed. And damn him if he couldn't feel the awkwardness of Matt spring up again as he kissed her back. He felt at peace as she wrapped her hands around his head, pulling him to her. She pulled away for a moment. "You see? I can feel you, you feel calmer as him."

He wanted to say a thousand things. But he wound up merely nodding.

"Then come away with me. Come to the Resistance, be Matt where nobody knows who he is."

The Resistance. Where his parents were. His parents who wouldn't be fooled by a blonde wig, glasses and an assumed name. Chewie would probably smell him out the second he set foot in their base.

"I can't." He pressed his forehead to hers. "But, maybe you could stay?"

Her eyebrows drew together, a furrow appearing. "With the First Order? I, I don't know."

"I'll still be Matt, if that will make you stay. I'll be Matt, you'll be Rana, and we can keep doing this."

She pressed her hand to his chest, and he felt his breath hitch a little. "If you promise to think of yourself as Matt, and occasionally as Ben, then I'll stay." He had barely nodded before she had pulled him back, her lips soft and warm. He could feel the bond, pulsing and growing every moment they were together. A rush of happiness went through him, Rey's feelings transmitting through it.

He was beginning to enjoy that bond.


	10. Chapter 10

**AN: Sorry for the delay. I had a busy weekend, didn't get a chance to write, and I managed to get this together. I feel like it could have been better, but I feel that this is pretty good.**

* * *

The ship slowed as it came out of hyperspace, the _Finalizer_ growing through the viewport. Rey looked over at Kylo, now back as Matt with his wig and glasses. He was gripping his chair tightly. Rey piloted the ship closer to the Star Destroyer.

"Unidentified craft, identify yourself and proceed away from us." A voice crackled over the comm system.

Rey reached for the reply button. "This is general repair tech Rana, with radar technician Matt. We managed to take over the ship and are reporting back."

The comm system was silent for a moment, before Hux's voice snapped through. "Proceed into the hanger. A squadron of TIE fighters will escort you, and if you deviate from the course a millimeter, you will be blasted." Sure enough, four of the fighters sped out from the bay, surrounding the ship. Rey did her best to keep her hands calm as they formed a square around the ship, bringing it into he hanger and landing.

The outer door hissed open, and Rey could hear Stormtrooper boots on the floor. She held her hands over her head, gesturing for Kylo to follow. He shifted behind her, both of them walking out to where the group of troopers were. They were escorted again, this time to the hanger itself. Hux, surrounded by a cadre of officers, was standing there, glaring at them. "Explain."

Rey did, quickly and skipping over how they had been distracted by making out in an alley. She left out using the Force, merely saying that they'd overtaken a worker who had come to sedate them again, and had used her blaster to incapacitate the rest. "Then I piloted the ship back, the guys who took us are in one of the cells."

Hux turned to one of the officers. "Lieutenant Colonel Zack, confirm their identities."

Zack stepped forward, "That's them. Thanks for ruining our vacation, guys."

Rey rolled her eyes. "Not our fault."

Hux gestured for someone to come forward. Two troopers were dragging somebody between them, they took him onto the ship and immediately sealed it. The ship then rose up by itself, and moved out away from the Star Destroyer. Hux looked over at an officer. "Tell the cannons to fire when ready."

There was a sudden burst of green laser fire, and the ship exploded in a fiery ball of metal and plastic.

Hux had a smirk on his face. "Gerani will be needing a new mayor." He then turned to Matt. "You, follow me. Everyone else, back to work."

Rey reached out and grabbed Kylo's hand. "Please don't kill him."

She saw his lips twitch upwards. "I make no promises." He stalked off after Hux, leaving Rey to find her way back down to her quarters and get back into her jumpsuit, grab her data pad, and head off to fix a engine panel that had been damaged during the fuel cell transfer. She was cross legged on the floor as she tried to twist it back into shape when a shadow fell over her.

A Stormtrooper was standing over her, the trooper's voice filtered but clearly female. "You cost me my day off."

Rey kept her eyes on the piece in her hand. "I didn't do it intentionally."

"I don't care." The trooper stepped closer, then a white clad foot reached out and kicked the piece in her hand away. "Nor do most of the others."

Rey reached for the piece, only to have it kicked away again. "Don't you have something better to do?"

"My guard shift here doesn't end for another three hours." The trooper replied, leaning up against the engine. She raised her fist and slammed it into the engine, denting the metal. "And there's a lot of things to break in here."

Rey could feel something in the Force whispering to her, telling her that she should just slam the trooper back against the wall, that she should pull off the trooper's helmet and watch the other woman's face turn blue as she choked the life out of her.

Rey just moved over, picked up the dented piece, and got back to work.

* * *

If there was anything more humiliating than being Matt the Radar Technician, it was Hux finding out. The man was full of himself, smirking as he dragged Kylo up to the bridge. Kylo was fairly sure he meant to reveal his identity to the whole crew, but he merely pointed to a broken console. "Fix it. It's been broke since Ren threw his last tantrum."

Kylo gritted his teeth, remembering destroying it. More Resistance bases were found, but all were empty. He had let his anger loose, smashing the console apart with his lightsaber. He knelt in front of it, having no idea what to do. "Alright."

Hux seemed content to watch him. "The man is an absolute child. An embarrassment to this organization. No wonder the Supreme Leader has little faith in him." His voice said he was sneering even if Kylo couldn't see it. "He lost a restrained prisoner, fully restrained and ready for interrogation."

Kylo pulled back from the console. He couldn't do anything to fix it, they'd have to get a new one. "Maybe he wasn't there when she escaped."

"Then maybe he'd do better work as a radar technician. You wouldn't mind his company, would you Matt?"

Kylo tried not to reach out and throttle the man, either by the Force or with his hand. "I can't fix this. You need a new one." He didn't even wait for Hux to dismiss him. He'd never let that man actually have proof that he was superior, he wasn't. Kylo was still higher, more powerful than him. Even if he was Matt.

There was something flowing through the bond, tiredness and anger. Rey? She had never struck him as the type to be angry needlessly. He followed the bond, leading him down to the engines. Half the plating from one had been wrenched off and thrown about the room, Rey was sitting on the floor, trying to match everything up. Kylo noted the red around her eyes, and on the tip of her nose. He knelt down by her. "Are you alright?"

She sniffed. "I'm fine, Matt." She rubbed her nose. "Kylo, sorry."

"Who did this?"

"Some pissed off trooper, blamed me for costing her a day off." Rey looked down at the plating around her. "I can't leave until it's finished." She had some of it organized like a puzzle, ready to pop back onto the housing.

Kylo reached over and fumbled his way through some of the pieces. He managed to line up a couple. "Like this?"

"Yeah, now we only have three hundred more to go." She laughed, but there wasn't any life in it. It took them hours to get through the pile and get everything back on. By the end of it, she was barely standing.

"Do, do you want me to help you to your bunk?" He reached out, wanting to put her arm over his shoulder, but unwilling to do it.

She yawned widely, stumbling off down the hallway. "I should be fine." He followed her anyway, even if he didn't take her hand. Rey almost weaved across the hallway, trying to thread her way through the night shift that was just getting to work. Finally, she stopped in front of her door, her fingers fumbling through the code to open it. "Good night, Kylo."

The door opened, but before she went in, he reached out and grabbed her. He enjoyed how she fit into his chest, how his chin tucked over her head. He could feel the bond, the calm merely a trickle compared to what it usually was. _Do you want me to find the trooper?_

She chuckled, and he found he liked the way her voice felt against his chest. _I kind of do._


	11. Chapter 11

Rey could feel the tense energy among the crew the second she stepped out of her bunk. Every one seemed to be scurrying around, glancing quickly around corners before they continued. It wasn't any better in the break room. Most people seemed to be bolting down their breakfast, barely chewing before they ran off to their work. Rey couldn't help but feel odd as she sat down and calmly ate her muffin. She barely looked up when a Stormtrooper came over to her table, merely thinking it was Tim.

The female trooper's voice filtered through. "Listen, I'm sorry. I transferred half my credits to your commissary account, just call him off."

"Who?" Rey asked, popping a pice of muffin in her mouth.

"Kylo Ren. He's fucking pissed, he's almost destroyed the bridge, half the troopers won't leave their rooms because he's made it clear he would kill them the second they came out. The most that anyone has gotten out of him is that somebody was disrespecting techs, and he's almost taken my head off. Twice."

"What makes you think it involves me?"

"Because you hang around with that little Matt dweeb, and he always goes on about how he talks to Kylo Ren." The trooper suddenly stiffened, looking around. "Shit." Rey could hear comm chatter from her helmet, and the trooper quickly left the break room. One of the doors opened, revealing the black robed figure of Kylo Ren, his mask shining in the lights. Rey couldn't help the little pull of fear that still came from seeing him dressed up like that. Kylo barely looked at any of them, instead following the trooper that had just left.

Rey was tempted to throw a muffin at his head.

Instead her data pad started chiming off the hook, massive repairs were needed in the bridge, and unless practically all the techs got up there _right now_ they had a good chance of falling out of orbit and crashing on Hyana. Rey quickly found herself in the turbo lift with about thirty other techs, all running to the bridge at a break neck pace. When they got there, Rey had to take a minute. She'd never seen quite this much destruction, electrical fires and slashed monitors abounded. Most of the officers seemed to have fled, several had to be pulled from underneath their workstations so the repairs could begin.

The only one standing was General Hux.

"I am going to murder him." Hux muttered, before turning to one of the lead techs. "How long until everything is repaired?"

The woman wiped grease from her forehead. "We'll get the computers up first to keep us in orbit, most of the other systems can get routed to the backups by the engines. But the consoles themselves? I'm thinking a couple of weeks, maybe more if we run round the clock shifts on them."

Hux brought his hand to his face, dragging it down. "Make arrangements for round the clock shifts. I swear, if the Supreme Leader wouldn't kill me, I'd space that Ren right now." Rey bent herself to the tasks at hand, helping with fire suppression and installing new parts.

 _Rey_ _._ Kylo's voice echoed through her mind as she stretched her back out. _Rey, I have arranged for lunch for the both of us in my quarters._

She rolled her eyes. _I don't have time for lunch._

 _Why?_

 _Because somebody threw a tantrum, and we have a single week to repair basically the entire bridge._

 _They refused to give the identity of the trooper who harassed you. They angered me._

Rey knelt back down, handing a part to a tech that had actually crawled into a workstation to repair it. _Then find something else to do besides give me more work._ Rey pulled back from the connection, turning her focus to the job at hand. They'd barely managed to get the orbiting computers repaired before their shift ended. The next group of techs had arrived, gaping at the shredded instruments.

She clapped one on the shoulder. "Good luck." She had barely reached the turbo lifts when her data pad chimed. It quickly flashed up a message.

 _Repairs Needed In: Kylo Ren's Quarters  
_ _What Needs Repairing: Console  
_ _Tech Requested: Rana  
Time: Now_

Rey was this close to helping Hux murder him.

* * *

Kylo paced across his room again. Did she get the request? Should he send it again? He looked at the table, set with some of the best food and dinnerware onboard. Sure he'd almost killed the officer's cook, but the Bantha filets that had been claimed by Hux were now perfectly cooked, waiting under a dome for Rey to show up. He'd also taken candles from his meditation shine and placed them on the table. Most of the holodramas had that, a candlelight dinner followed by dancing where the woman would swoon in her lover's arms and they'd go off to to the bedroom. Kylo felt rather smug about all his planning.

Matt couldn't do any of this.

The door opened, closing behind her as she stalked in. "You had better have actually broken something!" She yelled, stomping towards him. He suddenly felt overdressed in his robes, she was still in her jumpsuit and covered in grease and spark burns.

She looked beautiful, even if she was currently glaring at him.

"I, I thought you might like some dinner." He gestured toward the table, then moved over to pull out a chair for her. Rey kept glaring, her mouth all screwed up before she came over and sat down in a huff. He removed the domes, revealing the sumptuous meal. He had reached for his knife and fork, then realized that Rey was about to pick up the filet and take a bit out of it. "You don't eat it like that."

"Why?"

Kylo held up his utensils. "Because you're a human, and even from a backwater planet like Jakku, you should know how to use these."

She clenched her hands into fists, but relaxed and seemed willing to follow his instructions. Soon she was eating fairly normal, although she still had a tendency to chew with her mouth open. And talk with her mouth full. "I don't know why I'm doing this. The whole crew is particularly pissed at you right now."

"Why?"

He watched her chuckle, barely succeeding in not choking on what she was eating. "Because you scared the shit out of them. Apparently half the troopers wouldn't go on duty."

"If they didn't harass you they wouldn't have that problem."

"She apologized by the way. You can call off your little hunt." She replied, using her fork to stab at her vegetables a little more forcefully that what was strictly necessary. Kylo wanted to tell her that he'd almost tracked down that particular trooper, but she had gone into the barracks and he couldn't tell them apart. And Phasma was being stubborn, refusing to identify the malcontent.

He reached for his napkin, wiping his hands on it. Why was he sweating so much? Was it the robes? He'd never had that problem before. Was it her? He'd never felt like this around her when he was Matt. Awkward, embarrassed and pissed that the Force wouldn't allow him to turn invisible, yes. But sweaty, nervous? No, he'd never felt like that. He kept quiet, finishing his dinner. After collecting the plates and handing them to a service droid, he reached for a music player, activating the first file on it.

A soft melody started to play, conveying romance even with no lyrics. He held out a hand to Rey, hoping she wouldn't notice how sweaty it was. "Would you like to dance?"

He could feel her eyes boring into him before she sighed, grasping his hand and letting him pull her up. He'd seen dancing in the holodramas, big sweeping dances around massive ballrooms, and while his quarters were fairly large when compared to the rest of the ship, they were still too small to do that. Kylo settled one hand on her waist, pulling her other one up as he tried to lead her through a couple's dance that had been popular in the Empire's day. He would lead her through this, showing her how he felt with his incredible dance moves.

He tripped over his feet three times, her's twice, and wound up falling over when his foot got caught up in his robe.

Rey was laughing, and he could feel his cheeks burning. She was laughing, and he was a fool. He kept his eyes down, but she reached down and pulled him back up to his feet. The music player had switched to the next song, and instead of trying some impressive dance, she merely wrapped her hands around his shoulders. He brought his to her waist, pulling her closer. There was hardly any space between them, and all they did was sway back and forth. She smiled up at him. "Better?"

He nodded, bending slightly to kiss her. He could feel her fingers in his hair, and he wanted to do nothing more than pull her closer and bury his face in the side of her neck while she continued. She mentally chuckled, then proceeded to run her fingers down his neck, making him shiver. He could have stayed that way forever, feeling her underneath his hands and her mind through their bond.

But the music player only had so many songs on it before it shut off, leaving them holding each other.

Rey yawned, arching her hands over her head. Kylo looked around, trying to find some way to make her stay. He awkwardly gestured towards his bedchamber. "You could, um, sleep in there."

She cocked an eyebrow, looking at the door to the bedroom. "Nice try." She laughed, then reached up and drew him down so she could kiss his cheek. "Good night, Kylo."

"Good night, Rey."


	12. Chapter 12

Matt had reappeared by the time Rey finally had enough time to go back to the break room. She'd barely had time to do anything but repair work during the day, and thus had missed time with both Matt and Kylo for awhile. So she was glad to see that mop of blond hair hunched over whatever mush they had been serving. She watched him pull a long hair from it, "Disgusting."

She couldn't help but giggle. "Wow, that's a nice way to great your friend."

His head whipped around so quick his glasses almost flew off. "You're back."

"Yep, finally got time to eat breakfast." She sat down across from him, tearing apart whatever they'd been served. As usual, it was bland and overcooked. Zack and Tim quickly joined them, their trays piled with the mush.

Zack seemed quite peppy. "So, how was being kidnapped?"

Rey rolled her eyes up and shook her head. "Boring."

"Oh come on, no anguished declarations of love?" Zack chuckled, looking between Kylo and Rey.

Kyle's ears quickly turned a bright shade of red. "No."

"Dude, if you're gonna do it you'd better get a move on." Tim flicked aside a scrap of breakfast. "Rumor is, little Rana here was in Kylo Ren's quarters pretty late a few night ago." At that point, most of the other people in the break room perked up, looking over at their table. Even the Stormtroopers seemed interested. There was a palpable energy, everyone fully prepared for a lover's quarrel. Rey felt a slightly evil smile spread on her lips.

Kyle's face turned the same color as his ears. "I, uh, well." He fingers played with his cup, luckily empty as he tried to spin it and wound up flinging it halfway across the room.

Rey just beamed at Tim. "Oh, he's fine with it. Kylo Ren's on the list."

"List?" Tim asked.

"You know, if your partner ever had the chance to get with one person, they have your permission."

"And Kylo Ren's on yours?"

Rey couldn't help it. "Actually, he's on both of ours. I was going to invite Matt, but I got so caught up in everything it just slipped my mind." She looked over at Kylo, who had quickly tried to duck his head down so far it was amazing he hadn't slid under the table. "Sorry."

He mumbled some reply, and Rey could almost hear him grinding his teeth.

"So how was it?" Zack seemed rather interested.

"What?"

"Kylo Ren, what was he like?"

Rey leaned her chin on one hand, fluttering her eyelashes. "Well, first of all he's devastatingly handsome. And his lips are to die for." She could see a couple of the female techs leaning closer. "As for the body? Oh, honey. I don't think I've ever seen so many muscles. Totally shredded. And he was strong." She cast a glance at Kylo, who was turning a very interesting shade of purple. "But gentle, in fact, I think I might try and schedule another little visit. You wouldn't mind, would you Matt?"

Rey had to admit she enjoyed torturing the poor man.

"I, um, well, uh, no?"

"Oh, you're so sweet!" She leaned over and gave him a little kiss on the cheek.

"Hey!" One of the female techs called out. "How big was it?"

Now it was Rey's turn to blush a little. "Well, a lady doesn't enjoy it and tell." The entire break room started laughing, and Rey watched Kylo slide completely under the table. There was a sudden twinge in her stomach, and Rey realized she needed to get to a fresher right now. So she left poor Kylo under the table, practically sprinting to get to one. He could handle himself, but Rey could feel a sweat start to break out.

Damn it, of all the times, it had to be now?

* * *

He remained under the table until everyone had left, he could still feel his ears burning. Yes, he'd hoped she thought that about him. But to hear her say it, out loud, to everyone. Well it was either become extremely embarrassed, as Matt, or come back later and throw a fit as Kylo. And Rey was scary enough when she had chewed him out for the fit he'd already had. He watched as most of the people left, then pulled himself out from underneath the table.

He quickly tracked Rey through the bond. _Did you mean all of that?_

She sounded rather annoyed. _What, that stuff at breakfast?_

 _You said I was shredded._

 _Well, I mean I've never seen you with your shirt off, but from what I've felt you are pretty shredded._

He felt that damn blush returning. _You have, um, a nice body too._

 _Gee, thanks._ She sounded rather pained. In fact, he could feel her pain. Something that settled down low in his gut.

Kylo dropped his hand to his stomach, the pain intensifying. _Are you alright?_

 _Oh, no. Can you feel that? Kylo, ignore it. Ugh!_ The Force connection suddenly broke, and Kylo found himself panicking. Rey was in pain, that much was clear. But where was she? He found himself grabbing for any threads of the connection, following it down to her bunk. He pounded on it. "Are you alright?"

He could hear retching from inside. "Just go away, I'll be fine!"

Kylo quickly used the Force to open the door, coming in on a strange sight. Rey was on her bunk, curled up into a ball. She had pulled a waste receptacle over to her, and Kylo could smell vomit coming from it. She'd shed her jumpsuit was was wearing what he assumed were her pajamas, a white shirt and baggy black pants. Her face was white and sweaty. "You're sick!"

She was practically panting. "Yes, I am. And you should leave so you don't get sick." She suddenly retched again, pulling the receptacle up and puking into it. Kylo almost felt a little pleased. She was weak, she'd need help. He could help her. So he walked over and pulled her hair back as she threw up. Finally she spat into it, pulling a tissue to wipe her mouth with. "Seriously Kylo, you need to leave."

"Do you want me to take you to the med bay?" Kylo reached over to pick her up, but she rolled away.

"No. They won't be able to help." Her voice sounded defeated from where she had shoved her head into a pillow.

"Rey," He quickly grabbed her. "Rey, are you dying?"

"No, I'm not dying. This happens occasionally." She gave a retch, but shook her head. "Nothing left to come up." Her hands drifted to her stomach, massaging it lightly. Kylo wanted to reach over and help, but she seemed like the last thing she wanted was for him to touch her.

"Can I call someone? Your personal doctor, maybe?" He got up and started to look for her personal comm. He'd heard about flus that stayed dormant in the body until exposed to some kind of stimulus. Maybe all the work and stress had caused one to fire off.

"No, Kylo. Don't, I'll be fine." She gave another groan, then curled up on her side again.

He fished through what little storage she had, finally coming up with her comm, hidden behind a roll of socks. He quickly scrolled through, finding a contact labeled emergency. Well, if anything was an emergency this was. He punched in the frequency, waiting while it connected. "Don't worry Rey, I'll talk to your doctor. I'm sure he'll be able to help you."

The screen on the comm flickered, showing a frowning woman. Her brown hair was shot with silver, curled up in braids around her head. Kylo wanted to duck his head, or throw the comm away, or something.

"Ben Chewbacca Organa Solo! What are you doing wearing that wig?"


	13. Chapter 13

"Rey, why is my mother your emergency contact?"

"Because your mom's a badass." Rey mumbled, trying to find some position that offered any relief from the terrible cramps. She'd turn to the Dark Side in an instant if they had some way to get rid of these.

"Ben Solo, you take off that wig this instant!" Leia's voice was loud enough coming through the comm, Rey didn't want to think about how loud she was in person. Kylo, or rather Ben, only Ben could look that sheepish, pulled the wig off and folded up his glasses. "Now, put me on with Rey."

He handed the comm down, and Rey tried to give a weak smile. "Hi, General."

Leia wasn't impressed. "Rey, you look like shit."

"Well, I feel like shit at this moment in time."

"Why?"

"You know that birth control implant, the one that was supposed to make everything lighter and less painful? It made everything worse." Rey could feel her empty stomach sloshing around, and desperately wanted to throw up what ever was left. She took a few breaths to try and calm herself, cringing when she tasted what was left from her last puke on her tongue.

Leia pursed her lips. "Put me back with Ben."

Ben was currently clutching his wig tightly against his chest, his face more pale than usual. Rey, unwilling to move in her misery, waved the phone at him. He grabbed at it, almost disconnecting in his rush. "Hello?"

"I'm just going to assume you have a med bay on that hellhole you're in. Go to the med bay and get some painkillers and an implant remover. Ask a droid."

"But, Mom."

"Now Ben!" Leia barked, sending Ben running back out while still pulling the wig back on. The comm clattered to the floor, and Rey, with great effort, managed to drag it over to the bed. The General seemed expectant. "Now, when exactly did you find my son?"

"Um, like my first ten minutes on the ship. Apparently fate thought it would be hilarious to have us both be undercover at the same time."

"And how did you find out it was him?"

"Slavers, they caught us and everything kind of came out."

"Slavers attacked a First Order Star Destroyer." Leia raised an eyebrow.

Rey swallowed, her throat burning. "We were away, on a date."

"Hold on. I need to find Han." Leia was beaming now as she raced off, and Rey could hear her calling. "Han! Han! They were dating! You owe me fifty credits!" Rey found herself laughing a little. It was good to see the General like that, Rey had seen her stressed and concerned far too often. The comm screen shifted as someone picked it up.

Poe Dameron's smiling face filled the screen. "I haven't seen her that happy since Chewie threw Han at her after Starkiller."

Rey smiled, remembering how the Wookie had literally thrown Han once they had touched down on base. "I don't know, she was pretty happy when she found out about you and Finn."

Poe at least knew to blush. "Hey, apparently you've got a boyfriend too. Now we'll have to call each other up all the time and complain about them while drinking."

"Right now, all I want to do is complain and drink."

"You can't find any booze there?"

"Not for techs." Rey rolled her eyes. "Maybe I can get Kylo to steal some wine for me."

The comm shifted hands again, and Han was suddenly there, scruffy with stubble. "Rey, did he actually call it a date?"

Rey could hear Leia behind him. "You can't worm your way out of this one!"

Han turned around. "Hey, maybe she was just assuming."

"No, Han. Ben asked me out." Rey smiled. "You'd better fork over what you owe her before she gets more out of you."

"Damn it!" Han practically threw the comm, and Rey could hear him and Leia squabbling as they went off. It was nice to know everything at the base was at least somewhat normal. Finn and Poe were still mooning over each other, and at least Leia and Han were speaking now. The door opened, and Ben was back, holding a small bottle of pills and what looked like a large syringe. Rey set the comm down, still connected, and waved him over.

She tapped a spot on her bicep. "It's right here."

* * *

Kylo still had no idea what the hell was going on. All he knew was his mother started yelling at him, Rey was miserable for some reason, and he apparently had to go find pain killers. So now he was back, unsure what to do with the device the medidroid had indicated he should use. He could hear some argument coming from the comm, but there was no one on screen. "What do I do?"

Rey rubbed a spot, and he could swear he saw something underneath her skin. "I need to get this out. Just put the tube over this spot and pull."

He tried to keep his hands calm as he put the open end of the tube on her arm and started to pull the plunger. With a sudden movement, a small device shot out from underneath her skin and smacked against the side of the syringe. Blood started to well from the sit, but Rey waved the tube away and pressed a pad of tissues over it. Kylo tapped the little device out of the tube, blood smearing his fingers. "This is what was making you sick?"

"Yeah," Rey wiped up a small spot of blood on her arm, "I'm just glad suction is used to get it out. Used to be they'd cut it out of you."

"What is it?" Kylo set it down, grabbing a tissue to wipe off his own hand.

Rey smiled. "How much do you know about reproduction?"

"I know what sex is." Kylo could feel himself blush.

"Yeah, I figured you did. But what else?" Rey looked up at him. Kylo couldn't think of anything else, merely shrugging. Rey groped for the comm. "Leia, I'm going to kill your brother the next time I see him."

His mother's voice crackled. "Why?"

"Because I'm going have to explain the reproductive cycle to him." Rey shifted the comm away, then struggled into a sitting position. "Okay, just the basics right now. Women's bodies have a cycle they go through, and if you don't get pregnant during part of your cycle, your body flushes everything out to start the next one. For some people, this process is easy, for others it's really painful. So we have drugs to help us, and to keep us from getting pregnant, but sometimes things don't sync right and everything winds up worse."

"So, that's what happened with you?"

She nodded. "And that's all I'm telling you. It was better than the talk I got on Jakku when my cycle started." She reached over and grabbed a bottle of water from the floor by her bed, and quickly swallowed a couple of pills. Kylo wanted to smack himself. He should have warned her those were the strongest painkillers on the ship.

"Do you want me to get sanitation in here?" Kylo looked down at the waste receptacle. The whole room was starting to smell.

Rey shrugged. "Doesn't matter to me. I'm just going to be miserable for a while."

"Well it does to me." He reached down, collecting her little nest of blankets and the comm, which was still active.

Leia quickly appeared. "Is she better?"

"She took the strongest pills I could find." He tried to look at anything on the screen but at her.

"Make sure she gets rest. And you and I are going to have one massive talk next time she calls." The comm screen blinked off, and Kylo let out a little sigh of relief. He shifted everything around until he could carry the blankets and Rey in his arms.

She giggled as he lifted her up. "You're strong."

Kylo almost froze as she buried her head in his neck. "Come on, we're going to get you somewhere where you can sleep."

"Where?"

"My quarters."


	14. Chapter 14

These pills were the _shit_.

Rey barely felt any discomfort as Ben carried her through the ship, and she giggled every time he had to mind trick someone. She wound up laughing a lot, the poor guy seemed to run into a few dozen people before they were outside his door, which quickly opened to let them inside. He quickly walked past the little living room, and she heard him groan as he entered the bedroom. "Millicent! Off the bed!"

Rey looked over, spotting the orange tabby cat that was studiously ignoring Ben. "Kitty!" Rey struggled out of his arms, not caring that she was currently collecting a great deal of cat hair on her pajamas as she crawled over to the cat. It apparently deemed her worthy of giving out scratches, and stared purring as Rey curled herself around it. Rey continued her administrations. "I didn't know you had a cat."

Ben set the blankets on the end of the bed. "She's Hux's and I'm fairly sure he locks her in here just to screw with me." He looked down at the bed. "Look at all the hair! I'm going to have to call sanitation and it will probably take days to get it all off!" He turned around, removing his wig and glasses. "And the ash tray! Millicent, this is not a litter box!"

"What is in there, anyway?"

"Ashes from Endor trees. I couldn't exactly find where my grandfather's pyre was, and the ashes had probably been scattered anyway, so I just keep these here." He picked up the tray, putting it out the door and in the living room.

Rey nuzzled herself deeper into the comforter. It was black, of course, but very plush. Rey hadn't had a lot of experience with soft things, but was quickly deciding she liked them. Soft things were a great deal nicer than blowing sand and hard metal. The bed creaked as Ben sat on it, pulling off his boots. Millicent gave a little hiss as he started settling himself down. Rey moved her fingers to the cat's chin. "Shush Millie, he's just laying there."

"That thing is evil."

"This thing is adorable, and you need to get a cat." Rey reached over him for a nearby data pad. "So it and Millie can be friends." The data pad flared to life, and Rey quickly skimmed the holonet until she came across the Gerani pet rescue. She tapped on a picture, holding up the data pad so Ben could see the huge eared cat. "See? It looks just like you, Ben!"

He plucked the data pad from her hands. "Remind me to never give you painkillers." He set it down on the other side of the bed, grabbing the holovision remote instead. "I'd rather deal with you trying to kill me than being all loopy."

"You keep insulting Millie and I might." Rey replied, letting the cat crawl up onto her chest. Her claws were little pin pricks as she settled down, and Rey quite liked the glare the cat gave Ben. This cat would be a great friend to have, and would probably enjoy the Resistance base. Everybody there seemed to love animals, and several had pets that they let wander the base. Rey reached over to find the comm.

"What are you doing?"

"I'm going to call your mother and tell her she needs to come rescue Millie. Millie would be a great asset to the Resistance." Rey couldn't move that much, Millie would sink her claws in a little more every time she moved.

"Rey, you are not calling my mother. At least not until the pills wear off."

"You're such a shit, you know that?"

* * *

Kylo decided he did know that, and quickly grabbed the comm from where it was laying on the blankets and stuffed it into his bedside table. He turned the holovision on, scanning through until he found something interesting. Rey was currently snuggled up against his side, moving whenever the cat seemed to let her. She looked up as a flare of music preceded the credits. "Corellian Bachelor? What's that?"

The host, a bland looking human turned, to the camera. "Welcome, to another season of Corellian Bachelor. This season, Kenaw is searching for a woman to share his life, and the shipping business he runs. He'll have over twenty beautiful women to choose from, but there can only be one in the end." The screen switched to show a man, heavily made up to add to any attractive features, looking out over some Corellian jungle.

What Kylo assumed was Kenaw's voice came on. "I'm not just looking for a woman, I'm looking for someone I can share my life with. I always felt like no one would ever love me, and now I want to meet the one woman who I'll stay with for the rest of my life."

Rey scooted closer, placing her head on his chest. "So it's a dating show?" Millie gave a little mew of protest, but curled up between the two of them. Damn that cat, damn Hux, and damn whoever gave that stupid animal to him in the first place.

Kylo reached over, attempting to pet the cat, which hissed and starting to puff up. "Their success rate isn't very good. Two out of more than twenty five I think."

The show quickly ran through a group of women, most human, but there were a few other species mixed in. Including a blue skinned Twi'Lek, identified as Yik'Kapih. "I just want to find someone to spend my life with, and I am not here to make friends. I don't care what the other women say about me, all I care about is Kenaw."

Kylo couldn't help but roll his eyes. "Twi'Leks never make it past the third episode."

"Wait, you watch this too? Ben, you know way to much."

Kylo couldn't help the little shiver that ran through him as she pressed herself up against him. "There is downtime on the ship. I merely take advantage of it. If you had the holovision on Jakku, you would know all of this too."

"Yeah, ton of downtime being a scavenger." She snorted. "I think you just enjoy these trashy shows."

Well, yes he did enjoy it. He may be a Dark Side user, but he was still able to find humor in all of this. And yes, he may just want to stay in his bed, with Rey curled up against him, watching his shows and making little jokes with her. "Just watch, you'll be able to see why."

"You're weird, Ben." She mumbled, watching as the screen showed women getting out of luxury speeders, greeting Kenaw. They usually attempted some hug, one even tried a kiss, but all made their way inside. Kylo watched them drink enormous amounts of wine, listening as Rey gave a little moan. "Oh, that looks so good."

"You drink?"

"Sometimes. Poe gets really touchy, and you dad just pounds that brandy. You're mom matched him drink for drink one night." Rey perked up as one of the women threw a glass of wine at another. "Oooh, cat fight." Kylo watched two of the women fights, before security dragged them apart. Kenaw came in, acting as if he had single handedly defused the situation. Rey laughed. "What a dick, you could probably breathe on that guy and he'd fall over. The security did everything."

Kylo smiled. "Now you're understanding why I watch this." Kenaw stood in front of a table full of flowers, passing them out. Kylo tapped Rey. "Ten credits the Twi'Lek goes."

"You're on. If I win, I get to sleep in your bed more."

Kenaw wound up keeping the Twi'Lek, along with the two women who had got in the fight. Kylo had a sinking suspicion that was the producers, realizing that fights would get them more viewers. He always thought the producers had too much power on this show, and had watched several of his favorites get eliminated on the last season because they weren't interesting enough. Rey gave a little fist pump, and Kylo pulled her a little closer. Losing that bet wasn't such a bad thing.


	15. Chapter 15

Rey could slowly feel herself awakening, and she did not want to. Everything was warm and soft, and she was obviously not in her bunk because her bunk was never warm and rarely soft. There also wasn't enough room for a second person in her bunk, and Rey assumed there was another person in the bed with her. Unless she'd grown a third arm that liked to tighten around her waist and pull her closer. But then she heard the small sigh come from behind her, whistling over her ear.

Rey groaned, then tried to bury herself farther into the pillows. She remembered watching the holovision with Ben, and they must have fallen asleep at some point. The warm weight on her feet must be Millicent, and the cat was not pleased with Rey trying to move. Rey focused on her breathing, trying to lull herself back to sleep. But her body was reminding her that she needed the fresher, and it would appreciate some food, especially since she'd barely kept anything down yesterday.

Ben gave another little mumble, pulling her closer. Rey reached down, trying to dislodge his fingers. Finally she managed to lift his hand a little, managing to roll out from under his arm. She got up, straightening her pajamas. Ben rolled to the spot she had just left, and Rey could see his eyelids starting to flicker. There were only two doors in the bedroom, and she went to the one she was positive was the fresher.

And oh, what a fresher it was.

After using what she needed, Rey found herself staring at the shower. It was large, and it was for a single person! The floor and walls were black tile, with a glass door. Privacy, something she hadn't had in weeks. She had been so used to showering with everyone in her hall that she couldn't help herself. Ben was probably still asleep, he wouldn't mind her using it. She left her clothes in a small pile, then reached inside and turned the knob. She barely had to wait for hot water, and she quickly slid inside.

Rey couldn't help but slide into a contented state as the water washed over her. She quickly used her fingers to unbraid her hair, sliding the hair ties on her wrist like a bracelet. Ben seemed to keep his shower well stocked, and she grabbed his shampoo. He didn't have to deal with standard, unscented, First Order shampoo. No, he had some nice, scented stuff. She tried to place the smell. It was somewhat berry like, but not overpowering.

Rey would have to come steal this later.

It felt pleasant, and Rey enjoyed the feeling of her clean hair. She washed herself quickly with his bar of soap, which wasn't scented but left a nice clean smell. After singing herself one last time, and probably using the last of the hot water on the ship, she squeezed any water from her hair and stepped out to towel off. His towels were fluffy, and Rey found another thing to add to her list of things she was coming back for. She muttered it to herself as she pulled on her shirt. "The cat, the shampoo, and the towels." A quick rifle through a drawer revealed a comb, along with the eyeliner Tim had talked about. Rey slid the eyeliner into a pocket. He even had better makeup than her.

Ben was still asleep as she sat on the end of the bed, starting to comb through her hair.

* * *

Kylo remembered one time that he had accidentally wandered into a room where a few officers were celebrating something. He'd never exactly figured out what, but they had been talking about women and all the things women did. Most of it was foul and crudely expressed, but one of them had clutched his brandy and gone on a tangent. "Boys, there's nothing better than to see a woman brush her hair. They seem to have figured out how to make it fall just right, and I swear I have a hard time not dragging my wife to bed when she sits there brushing her hair." It was a rather romantic notion Kylo thought, especially when he opened his eyes to see Rey combing her hair at the end of the bed. Her hair was wet, but still fell nicely.

The comb suddenly stopped in her hair, and she whispered. "Shit! Come on you son of a bitch." He watched her pull the comb over a section of her hair again and again, pulling a little harder. He winced in sympathy as a few hairs came loose, and Rey paused her combing. She turned around. "Good morning, your shower is awesome."

He blinked. "You slept in here?"

"Well, I wasn't about to go wander back to my bunk. Your bed is way too soft, and besides," she gestured at Millicent with the comb, "Millie wouldn't let me leave, even if I tried to."

Kylo rubbed a hand across his eyes, it was far too early to deal with Hux's cat. "And you used my shower?"

"Hey, you were holding out on me." Rey finished pulling the comb through her hair. "I couldn't help myself."

He rolled his eyes, quickly going to use the fresher himself. He peeled off the jumpsuit he'd wound up sleeping in, exchanging it for what he had tucked into a drawer. He came back wearing only a pair of baggy pants, rubbing his face with a towel. A little cold water made him feel a lot more awake, and he quickly used a data pad to order up breakfast, delivered by service droid. Rey kept staring, and finally came over. Kylo tried not to flinch when she reached out and touched his chest. "Wow, you really are shredded."

He shrugged. "Combat training."

He reached for a shirt, but Rey stopped him. "No, no shirt until I leave."

Kylo felt like he should give her some kind of knowing smile, or maybe try and distract her, but he could only nod. He reached out, brushing his fingers through her hair. He'd never seen her with her hair unbound, it hung down over her shoulders and he could still see a few drops of water at the very end. He didn't mind the wet, and Rey seemed to lean into his hand. She gave a little moan. "You keep doing this and I may never leave."

He kept it up, letting his fingers fall from her scalp to the ends of her hair. It was a bit of a disappointment when the service droid beeped outside. He opened the door, and Millicent quickly ran out as he grabbed the tray of food. He'd made sure to order just about everything from the menu, and watched Rey stuff her mouth with everything she could. He ate quickly too, he would be needed as Kylo Ren today. Hux had planned another blasted troop review, and if he wasn't there it would be taken as an insult.

Rey stood at the door. "This was fun."

Kylo finished securing his robes, his helmet in his hand. "If I took those pills, I'd probably think that too."

"You didn't enjoy it?" Rey tilted her head, walking up to him on her tip toes. Her lips brushed his ear. "And here I thought you were."

Kylo gripped his helmet a little tighter. "No, it was, it was great."

Rey quickly kissed him, then whispered again. "If your towels go missing, it wasn't me."


	16. Hux, Phasma, and Millicent

**AN: Feeling a little under the weather, there's a nice crud going around. Wednesday's update will probably be pushed to Friday.**

* * *

Hux was almost to the hanger where the review of the new troops would take place when a streak of orange shot out from a nearby hall. He paused to smile down at the tabby that was currently twining about his ankles, holding a black sock in her mouth. He leaned down to scratch her, accepting her prey when she dropped it. He smiled down. "Good work Millicent."

He slipped the sock into his pocket as a extremely pissed off Kylo Ren came into view. One foot was bare, the boot in his hand as his masked face tilted down to glare at the cat. Even his voice filter couldn't hide his frustration. "That thing has stolen my sock. I insist you hand it over for immediate disposal."

Hux reached down and lifted Millicent into his arms, where she started purring contentedly. "I'm not sure what you mean. Millicent has been with me the entire time."

"You locked her in my quarters last night."

"Perhaps you left the door open." Hux couldn't help the smirk on his face. "Or maybe Matt did, the poor man is quite incapable with even the simplest technology."

"I still do not have my sock and I have chased that thing across two decks of the ship." Kylo made a grab for the cat, but Hux stepped back.

Millicent flattened her ears and hissed at Kylo, and Hux dearly wanted to do that same. "I think you're confused. Millicent has been with me since I left my quarters. More than likely your sock was misplaced with the laundry. And how exactly did you walk out without it?"

Kyle's hands tightened into fists. "I stopped in a fresher and noticed a scuff on my boot. When I removed it, and the sock to clean it, that beast proceeded to scratch my hand and steal the sock."

"I'm sure you were very scarred by that experience." Hux couldn't help the sarcasm that laced his tone. "But I believe it was another animal. I could easily ask the Supreme Leader to authorize a pest control division of the Stormtroopers if you feel it is needed." He smirked. "Of course, you would have to explain what happened to necessitate such a venture."

Kylo dropped his boot and proceeded to shove his foot into it. "I must have been mistaken. I will speak to the laundry detail immediately. They should be keeping an accurate account of the clothing they take in and send back out."

"Yes, but it is hard to keep track of everything, since most of it is the same color." Hux shifted Millicent as he started toward the hanger. The cat reached up to bat at the small cap on his head, but stilled when he gently pushed her paw back. "Although, you don't seem to have that problem."

Kylo stayed silent as they made their way to the hanger, and he kept marching towards the new troops even as Hux stopped to speak to Captain Phasma as she surveyed her new underlings. "Phasma, you look remarkably shiny today."

"Sir, Millicent." Phasma looked down, reaching out to scratch Millicent behind her ears. The cat leaned into the pressure, occasionally glancing at her reflection in Phasma's armor. "The new troops are rather green, but I will have them whipped into shape soon."

"I have faith in you Phasma." Hux said as he watched Kylo Ren test one trooper, whirling his lightsaber around. "Also, if you find yourself in need of any repair in your sector, address your requests to Matt."

"Sir?"

"Matt." Hux said, nodding his head toward Kylo. "I hear he is quite accomplished."

"Understood Sir, I will do as you ask."

Hux watched Kylo stalk along the line of troops. The one who had almost been slashed by the lightsaber had recovered from the tentative step he took back. The man had tightened his grip on his blaster, and Hux could see the way he breathed deeply to calm himself. He gestured to the trooper. "Assign him to a non combative detail, and ensure that he is placed in a battle simulation course until he has recovered."

"Forgive me, Sir, but the battle simulator has been damaged for the past month."

"Sounds like an excellent opportunity for Matt, doesn't it?"


	17. Chapter 17

Rey slammed her fork down onto her tray, discarding another plan. There wasn't any way she'd be able to move through the ventilation system, not unless she wanted to get shredded by a fan. How could getting into Kylo's room be so damn hard? She just thanked the Force that he had been gone for the past few days, apparently consumed with some massive project. As it was, Tim and Zack were still eating lunch with her.

Tim looked up. "Please tell me you're not going to throw a tantrum. I've had enough of those lately."

Rey tucked an errant piece of hair behind her ear. "No, no. I'm just trying to figure out something. How could I get into someone's quarters? Like someone higher up?"

Zack quickly got up. "I don't even want to know what you're planning." He swiped his try up and moved across the room.

Tim snorted. "He just doesn't want to get interrogated about it later."

"Seriously Tim, how could I get in someone's room?"

"Like who? Kylo Ren?"

"Yeah, I'm planning something."

"Does that something involve a sexy surprise because I will gladly help out." He cocked an eyebrow, and Rey had to roll her eyes. "Kidding, kidding. The only way I could think to get into an officer's quarters is to get a sanitation key."

Rey groaned. "Damn, that's near impossible."

"Yeah, that's the point." Tim scooped up some of his lunch. "What are you planning anyway?"

"Towels, someone told me he's got like the softest towels."

"You're prepared to risk your job for towels?"

"Hey, I'd rather go out that way than blown up." Rey grabbed for her drink. "Or slashed because Kylo Ren had a tantrum."

"You steal his towels he's going to have one."

"I don't intend to be there when he finds out. Go in, get the towels, get out and hide for the rest of the week."

Tim glanced aside. "Listen, I'll ask. But if this gets out, I had nothing to do with it." He grabbed his tray and left the break room. Rey drained the last of her blue milk and left to go to her next call. She'd tried to get into Kylo's quarters already. She'd snuck up to his door and punched in what she had thought was the code, but those pills must have really screwed with her head because all that had happened was a service droid bringing her a glass of livi juice.

She drank it of course, no reason to be rude to the poor droid.

She was currently working on a TIE fighter, adjusting the angles on the wind panel. That didn't require a whole lot of focus, so she tried to figure out how to get a sanitation key. She didn't know any of the troopers who worked in sanitation. Maybe Finn did, he might be able to give her a name who would be sympathetic to her. She'd have to get him on the comm, which she was fairly sure she had taken back from Kylo's room.

Her mind alternated between Ben, Matt and Kylo. Matt she saw the most when he was wearing his wig and vest, the awkward little dork she enjoyed working with. Ben was when he started to relax, and she could see a little of Han in him, that same kind of roguishness. Kylo was when he was acting like a shit and she wanted to screw with him. Rey was so focused on sorting out her thoughts that she didn't even hear the Stormtrooper's footsteps.

"General repair technician, designation Rana?" It was a female voice, filtered through the masks audio feed.

Rey looked up, blanching a little at the chromium plated visage. "Yes, Captain."

"Stormtrooper TM-3147 has been seen in sanitation, and under questioning, revealed that you are attempting to gain access to Kylo Ren's quarters."

Rey focused her eyes as hard as she could on Phasma, trying to use the Jedi Mind Trick. "No, I would never try and gain access to Kylo Ren's rooms."

"Then I should not tell you that TM-3147 will not be receiving sanitation duty as punishment, that he will not be attending to Kylo Ren's quarters on the fourth day of the seven day cycle that is currently occurring. And that Lieutenant Colonel Zack will not be overseeing the security holocams at that time, and that there will not be a planned outage from 1000 to 1030 hours. And that a radar technician, designated Matt, will not be returning to his quarters at approximately 1045 hours for a shower after he was not doused in coolant." Phasma leaned her head down. "Is that clear?"

"Yes, Captain."

"And if any holovids are taken of the ensuing events, they should not be uploaded to the HoloNet and any links to them should not be forwarded immediately to myself and General Hux."

"Of course not, we all know how important Kylo Ren's reputation is."

* * *

Kylo wanted to bash his head against the main battle simulator computer. He hated this! He knew nothing about computers, or hologram projectors, or any of this but kriffing Phasma had basically forbidden him from going on any other assignment until he had repaired this. What was worse was that he was continually under guard, and from the new Stormtroopers to boot. He, the Master of the Knights of Ren, had to be babysitter by a soldier who could barely hold a blaster correctly.

He hadn't seen Rey in days either. Of course Kylo had told a medidroid to alert him once she had come back to the med bay, but Hux had let Millicent into his quarters and the damn cat had curled up in his mask and tried to bite him every time he had tried to grab it. And he couldn't leave without his mask, he had to appear intimidating to the new soldiers.

By the time he had got there Rey had left, and he'd had to use the Force to get the medidroid to tell him what she had done there. It had beeped out that she received a new implant, and the one she received had a 98% positive impact in patients who had experienced negative impacts with the previous brand. Another push also showed him that Rey had ordered the droid to never let her near those painkillers again, that it was to consider them hazardous to her health.

Kylo had most definitely not spent the next three hours berating himself for ordering the medidroid to bring him the strongest painkillers it had access to last time. He had not considered calling his mother and asking her if he did the wrong thing. He did not wind up binging on his HoloFlix account in order to take his mind off of it, and he certainly did not do that while finishing a fifth of Corellian brandy in a fashion that would have made his father weep.

He also did not destroy a set of ancient computers, and did not kick the scorched parts into smaller pieces.

He most certainly didn't threaten to kill the trooper that had come across him.

And now he was stuck fixing this fracking simulator, going off a manual that seemed to have been written in an ancient dialect of Huttese and had been solely written to frustrate him. There wasn't even another tech to help him. He quickly flipped a series of switches, and felt a little hope rise as the computer seemed to whir to life. It started to go faster, and he almost smiled.

There was a discordant squeal, a flash of sparks, and not only the computer, but the lights crashed.

The trooper by the door flicked the switch. "I think the lights are out."

"Well that is rather obvious." He replied, trying to get away from the now loudly beeping computer.

"Have you ever fixed something like this before?"

Kylo did wind up banging his head against the wall, cursing Hux and Phasma with phrases that would have found him disembowled in Kashyyk.

Uncle Chewie would have been so proud.


	18. Chapter 18

**AN: Updates will probably go down to one a week. Damn my thesis that I have to do to graduate from college!**

* * *

Rey watched as a Stormtrooper, she assumed it was Tim, pushed the laundry cart towards her. Her wristchrono quickly beeped, informing her that 1000 hours had just come up and she needed to get her ass moving. She slid out from the wall she was hiding behind, falling in step with Tim. "So, what did Phasma have to do to get you to cave? Breathe on you?"

"She's very intimidating." Tim's voice was filtered, but still fairly petulant.

"Yeah, and if she wasn't interested in this whole thing you would have gotten me spaced. Just, boom, right out the airlock." Rey let her fingers pop out in an imaginary explosion. "Why is she interested in this anyway?"

"Because she can't stand Ren." Tim said, pulling out the sanitation key. The door to Kylo's room quickly opened, and Tim pushed the cart inside. He was already tugging his helmet off as Rey stepped through to get to the fresher. "I can't think of anyone on this ship who can stand him. Aside from Matt, anyway. How is your nerdy little boyfriend?"

Rey knelt down and started pulling towels out from a cupboard. "Absent for the past few days."

"Still nerdy?"

"Yeah, but he'll shut up for awhile if I kiss him."

"Ah, ah, ah. I don't need to hear about that." Tim called from the bedroom, pulling dirty sets of robes out from a drawer set in the wall. Rey set her new towels in the cart, letting Tim cover them with the dirty robes. Rey laughed for a solid minute when Tim pulled out a collection of crop tops, cut to show off Kylo's abs. The suspenders on the pants almost killed her, and she had shoved a towel in her mouth to keep herself under control.

There wasn't much left in Kylo's fresher. She'd cleaned just about everything out, there wasn't much left. She'd also slid his new tubes of eyeliner into her pocket, and had wrapped up his supply of shampoo in a few towels. If only she could wrap Millicent in one she'd have her whole list gathered.

Tim was looking at all the texts on the HoloReader left by the bed. "Damn, I don't think this guy could be anymore in love with the Empire."

"Don't you mean Darth Vader?"

Tim snorted. "More like Darth Gayder, why would anyone admire that guy? Seven foot, cyborg creep." He grabbed for the data pad next. "Wow, this guy watches a lot of trash." There was a sudden flash from the data pad, and Tim started tapping away on it. "Phasma will want to see this. But I've got to put a bet down before I show it off."

"You guys bet on what Kylo Ren watches?" Rey asked, glancing at her wristchrono. They had about ten minutes left, probably closer to seven since they should be gone before the security cams came back on.

"Rana, I don't think there's anything that goes on that we don't bet on. I won thirty credits when they served blankenmeal for breakfast one day."

"And how many bets involve Matt?"

"Well, there were a few that he'd wind up spacing himself within a week of him showing up. I lost ten credits on that. Right now there's pretty good odds running about Matt being Kylo Ren in some weird undercover scheme to weed out traitors. General Hux put up a hundred credits in favor, and Phasma put up fifty. I don't really believe that, but I'm not going to go against them. Superior officers do tend to have better intel."

"What are the odds?"

"Right now they're running about one to fifteen."

"Put me down for fifty. I could use a little extra spending money."

* * *

Kylo couldn't believe that those _idiot_ Stormtroopers had had the audacity to spill coolant all over him. Why did a battle simulator even need coolant? It wasn't an engine, it didn't need anything to keep it cool. Oh, they'd quickly apologized. We're so sorry, we didn't even see you there. You'd better go wash that off, it will probably start to burn soon. Kylo angrily made his way down the halls, his menace quickly evaporating when his boots started to squeak.

He couldn't wait to get back to his quarters. He'd take a nice long shower and stay there the rest of the day. Screw Phasma and her computer, he'd barely seen Rey and the few times he'd tried to get at her through the Force bond she'd pushed him away and said she was concentrating on something. He'd been eating a lot more of their supply of Kashyyk chocolate lately, something that damned Wookie who had helped raise him had gotten him hooked on.

He couldn't help it, it just tasted so good.

Kylo gave a little sigh as he walked into his quarters, noting that sanitation had been by. His bed looked freshly made, his HoloReader and data pad aligned on the table beside it. He dropped his jumpsuit and vest in the hidden laundry hamper, pitching his boots and socks on top. His wig and glasses went in the sink to soak in some water. He could feel the coolant drying on him, making his skin start to itch. He turned on the shower, his fingers sticking slightly to the glass as he stepped in.

Force but the water felt good, warm enough that he barely shivered as his feet brushed the cold tile. He could practically feel the coolant washing away, and ran his hands up his arms to try and get more of it off. He grabbed the bar of soap, running it over as much of his body as he could. He tried to find the shampoo, but it was strangely absent. Maybe he'd used up the bottle? That was probably it, he'd used the last of it and forgot to grab a new one. He'd just rinse his hair then, maybe run the soap through it.

That would matt his hair down though, and it didn't have the volumizing component that he liked.

He just settled for rinsing his hair, and ran his hands over his body. Nothing was sticky now, just slick and clean. Maybe he'd try and get Rey up, tempt her with the shower. He reached a hand around the shower door, groping for a towel. But there was only a bare rod, nothing hanging from it. He opened the door fully, letting out the steam that had built up. There wasn't a towel hanging on the hook across the way either.

Maybe sanitation had forgot to put out his new towels when they took away the old ones?

They'd done that before. Kylo cautiously stepped out of his shower, slowly making his way across the tile. He knelt down and opened the cupboard below his sink. There wasn't a towel left, nor any shampoo. He slammed the door shut, standing up. The only thing left to dry with was a small hand towel that had been crammed into a corner. He grabbed it, debating what he was going to do to the Stormtrooper who had been on sanitation duty today.

Disembowelment seemed a perfectly reasonable option.

It was settled then, he'd get on a set of robes and head out to go deal with this. He opened his closet, and the back of it stared at him. Where were his robes, his pants and boots. They'd taken every one of his robes, too?

Decapitation started sounding better.

He went to the command console, entering a request for a service droid to be sent immediately with towels and a bathrobe. The screen pinged, showing an animated Stormtrooper attending to a droid. A cherry little jingle played before a voice came on. "We're sorry, but all service droids are undergoing required maintenance. If this is an emergency, please go to the department you require to have your issue resolved. Thank you for using the First Order's service module. All hail Supreme Commander Snoke!"

The screen shut off, and Kylo was faced with a decision. He could wait, naked, in his room and wait for the service droids to come back online. And more than likely the droids would have their privacy protocol rerouted and everyone would know. Or, he could make his way down three decks to the laundry department and request his robes and towels immediately. He could more than likely mind trick anyone who saw him, and his reputation would be somewhat secure.

He pulled his helmet on, placed the hand towel over the most important bits, and set off.


	19. Chapter 19

**AN: Alright, I know I've been away from this for far too long. And my inspiration is slowly starting to trickle back, but it's only a trickle right now. After I finished my thesis, I had finals, a whole week of a County Fair that I had to work every day, several cattle auctions that I had to work (but I did get to hang out with a buffalo named Buffy that I so want to steal from my friend), most of my herd of cattle calving, three graduation ceremonies and applying for a doctoral program.**

 **TL;DR My life got really busy and I didn't have the time or inspiration to write, but it slowly coming back to me.**

* * *

Rey rode in the laundry cart, only hopping out when Tim rounded a corner that put him out of sight of the security cams. She wrapped all her prizes in the towels, folding them so it looked like she was just coming back from the laundry. Tim assured her that he'd hide the robes for awhile, there were laundry misplacements all the time. They parted with a crisp high five, and Rey took he turbolift down to the dorms and dropped off her towels.

When she came out there was a sudden burst of activity in the female dorms, a rush for the turbolifts. Rey shrugged, joining in the frenzied female flood. After getting in one of the lifts, she turned to one of the other girls. "What's going on?"

The girl looked up at the readout, almost angry the lift wasn't rising faster. "Jenu heard from her friend in the security banks that Kylo freakin' Ren is wandering around shirtless. And pantless."

"So?"

"Apparently, he's unbelievably hot. Jenu's friend is capturing as many holos as she can, but Herta saw him on deck five and said that holos are nothing like seeing it in person."

A little smirk appeared on Rey's lips. "She saw, 'it'?"

"Not exactly, he's got a towel over the juicy bits, but his ass is so tight." The doors opened, and there was a sudden shift as everyone streamed out, but then milled around. A few darted down different hallways, but then returned, heads swiveling around.

Rey lifted her eyebrows. "So, does anyone know where he is?"

A chorus of 'no', 'shit', and 'damn it, why didn't anybody think of that', rang out. The girl Rey had beens standing next to started messing with her comm, before pointing down a hallway. "He's down there!" The herd moved rapidly, and Rey couldn't help but grin as they raced on. Quite a few Stormtroopers joined, and a series of squees rose from the beginning of the herd.

Elbows were thrown, people were shoved, and Rey quickly tried ducking through to the front. She couldn't help but grin at what she saw. A pair of muscular legs, leading up to a well muscled back, and completed by an ass so tight Rey bet she could bounce a credit off it. The only thing that ruined it was the helmet covering that luscious head of hair. Ren turned from the officer he'd been arguing with, then took a step back. A hush fell over the crowd.

"It's true."

"The stories were right."

"A damn eight pack."

"Shit, I owe Matt twenty credits."

"Somebody get that towel, we need to see what's underneath!" A girl in the back, who had been jumping up over the heads of the crowd to see suddenly shouted, posting at Ren's crotch. Rey licked her lips, crouching down. It almost seemed like everyone was doing that, getting ready to pounce like a herd of tusk cats. Kylo moved first, darting down a hallway, and there was second of hesitation before the women took off. Rey let herself fall towards the middle of the pack, slowing a little when she saw Phasma and Hux standing off to the side.

"It seems to be going according to plan, Sir." Plasma's modulated voice was rather muted. "The holos and vids are already spreading across the Holonet. It will only be a matter of time until Supreme Leader Snoke is informed."

A huge shit-eating grin spread across Hux's face. "Excellent, and one of the techs has already begun making a calendar of Ren. The man will never be respected again. I must admit Phasma, this was ingenious of you."

Rey stumbled, but then put the speed back on. She wanted to be there when that towel was yanked off, and she might be the one to do it.

* * *

Kylo tried his best to maintain his dignity as he made his way down the hallway, as if the Master of the Knights of Ren made his way through his flagship mostly nude every day. He was glad for his helmet, he just knew his cheeks were as red as a red giant star. He gritted his teeth as he made his way through a variety of hallways, doing his best to ignore the gaping mouths that seemed to occur along his path. One transport mouse droid even ran into a wall, before following him closely and beeping.

If the security team had attached a holocam to that, he swore that he would take his lightsaber and destroy every monitor in their quarters.

He almost growled as every tech seemed to vanish right before he was about to Mind Trick himself out of their memory. A whir caught his ears, and he looked up. Every single security cam was tracking his progress. He tighten his grip on the towel over his crotch. His other hand reached up to touch his helmet, reassuring himself that his helmet was still in place.

The first follower that appeared was a tech, who had his own personal cam pulled out. Every time Kylo tried to grab him the Jawa-spawn ducked down a hallway, before reappearing shortly. A small part of his brain was flattered, he knew he was irresistible, why shouldn't the poor boy be enraptured with him? But there was a difference between tasteful stalking and this unashamed obsession. The first follower was quickly joined by several others, and every time he tried to Mind Trick them, their minds only paused for moment before falling back into their track.

If he hadn't been wandering practically naked through the _Finalizer_ , Kylo would have gloated about how his body was so overwhelming that it affected the Force. Probably to Rey, and then she would ask to touch his body, to confirm for herself of course. Which would be immediately followed by him sweeping her off her feet, quite literally, and laying her down on a bed covered in Coruscant roses.

Kylo had just spotted a commissar, and was getting ready to ask him to place an order for a large shipment of roses when a sudden movement caught his eye. It seemed like every female tech, and Stormtrooper, had gathered. Personal cams, comms, and a variety of other holo capturing devices were already flashing. Some attention was fine, but now he felt like some strange prey, facing down a mass of starving predators.

Keeping one hand over his jewels, Kylo turned and raced away. He didn't know where he was running, only that he had to get away. None of the hallways seemed to make sense, but he just ran randomly. Above one hallway was a catwalk, currently occupied by Phasma and Hux. The ginger haired general was smiling. "Why Ren, I didn't realize you had such exhibitionist tendencies." He fairly purred, he sounded so pleased. "You seem to be causing quite a commotion amongst the female members of the crew."

Kylo couldn't speak, but he threw his hands up in a series of signs that would have offended half the galaxy and led to an immediate death sentence on five separate planets. Uncle Chewie would have been extremely proud.

* * *

The rebel base had come to a standstill, everyone watching a variety of monitors. Poe was laughing so hard that Finn was worried he might pass out, as the holo angle switched again. A frazzled Kylo Ren was racing away from a flock of women, who seemed solely focused on tackling him and removing that little hand towel from his person. A chat window next to the video was quickly filling with comments, and Finn grinned when he saw the advertisement pop up. He tapped it, and an order form came up.

Poe cracked up again, his words barely discernible. "General Leia will love that."


End file.
